Seven Years Bad Luck
by Feelin Glayish
Summary: If you look into the broken pieces and cannot find your reflection, the magic of seven years bad luck will take effect. In the spring of '91, Neville Longbottom broke a mirror. And in their 8th year, Pansy Parkinson broke one too. Neville/Pansy
1. Chapter 1

**SEVEN YEARS BAD LUCK**

* * *

><p><strong>Chapter 1 ~Remedial Heroes and Where to Find Them~<strong>

* * *

><p>Hogwarts was quiet.<p>

Neville walked the corridors, feeling a little bit like a ghost wandering around. The attendance was at an all time low, the lowest in a couple centuries at least. Where there used to be children in robes littering the castle there were empty spaces. It was bizarre, coming back here, seeing the broken crossbeams and spell burnt walls that hadn't been repaired yet; seeing the empty spaces where students used to congregate.

Neville supposed that it was hard not to focus on the faces of the people who'd returned as well. People he'd never even talked to once in his seven years at the school were familiar faces now. He'd been struck up in a conversation with the group of returning eighth year Hufflepuffs. They'd been in Dumbledore's Army, but he'd never actually spoken to them without some threat or mission or spell work hanging over his head.

He vaguely wondered how Harry Potter felt, if it was this relieving for him to talk about simple mundane things.

Being an 'eighth year' student was a lot like being spill over. Rituals like the Welcoming Feast and Sorting were comforting but he knew he was skimming off the top, not really belonging there. He supposed a war right in your own home could make anyone feel displaced. Curfew was closing in fast and though he wasn't worried about being caught by a prefect – it seemed silly now anyway after running a rebellion for so long – Neville was completely and utterly knackered.

He waved to a group of returning students, younger than himself of course, as he hopped onto one of the floating staircases. It seemed like just yesterday he'd been tumbling down them and holding on for dear life waiting for a professor to collect him.

Still, the feel of the sword of Gryffindor was still ghosting across his hands, the whispered cruel words and curses of the Carrows snuck up on him occasionally from behind coats of arms. Neville always had trouble remembering, but for once he couldn't exactly forget.

It was peace. Neville smiled idly to himself.

He got to the top of the fragmented staircase with red and gold tapestries hanging in tatters from its sides. The Gryffindor stood there waiting for it to bank right but the sentient staircase seemed to have better ideas and attached itself to the seventh floor. He waited a few more moments but the stairs did not budge.

A bit annoyed, he got off them and a moment later they broke away from the floor and twirled away back down for more students.

Neville scrubbed at his neck and ambled down the new corridor, intent on finding another set of stairs to get back on track.

He didn't think he'd find trouble instead.

* * *

><p>"<em>You're disgusting.<em>" A weedy younger looking Gryffindor boy was pointing his wand at someone just beyond a bend in the wall.

Neville paused, biting his lip with his slightly oversized front teeth.

There was a _group_ of weedy teenage wizards, all with their hoods up and wands pointing towards someone unknown.

"After what you pulled last year, you've got a lot of nerve showing your ugly nose here again!" Another of the boys angrily thrust his wand forward and a shot of yellow light flashed.

There was a high pitched yelp of pain followed by a string of curse words.

Hexes began flying fast and furious and Neville had to duck in order for a Bat Bogey Hex to go sailing over his head. He whipped around and saw the group of boys sending a volley of spells at their victim who was spending more time dodging than retaliating.

Neville quickly drew his wand and pushed up his jumper sleeve. It was too early in the school year for this kind of bullying. His book bag dropped to the stone floor with a loud thud as he ran forward.

"Stop it!" He warned, tying the other Gryffindor's arm to a tapestry with a well placed lasso charm.

Neville pulled back the boy's hood.

It was Dennis Creevey.

A feminine snarl filled the hallway and one of the bullies was struck down with a curse that caused his finger and toenails to start growing vines.

Neville dashed forward and realizing the person being attacked was _a girl_ made him all the more cross.

"STOP!" He yelled and slid into the girl to try and protect her and they went flying to the stone floor. He managed to pull her to his chest and take the brunt of the fall in his right shoulder as he threw up a shield charm just in time for the _Anteoculatia_ hex to bounce off.

There was no way he was showing up to the common room the first night of school looking like a moose.

It was in that brief second of imagining himself with antlers that he realized he was holding Pansy Parkinson.

Well it _looked_ like Pansy Parkinson. Half her head was growing oak leaves.

She stared up at him, dark hair wild about her face and then spit out an acorn which nailed Neville in the eye. She then kicked him in the shin and Neville yelped, watching her with one wide eye as she hobbled up and raised her wand again.

"Think twice before you mess with _me._" She wheezed towards her attackers, and flung her arm back with a blinding blue light gathering at the tip of her wand.

"No-No way," Neville didn't even hear himself ramble. She'd take down half the wall with that spell!

Just as her arm came forward like she was lobbing a quaffle, Neville sprung up and grabbed her round the middle, lunging so her aim went wide.

Pansy screeched and the next thing he knew, there was a loud crash and glass began showering the entire floor.

Everything stood still for a moment of silence before Neville even attempted to move. He could feel the shattered glass sprinkled all over his back and then he heard it the few telltale crunches as the group of boys ran away.

Almost lazily he opened blue eyes that had become screwed shut in the fallout and saw his reflection in a large shard of glass lying near his face. He looked confused. Nothing new there.

"Longbottom. Get off me."

And he was on top of Pansy Parkinson. Hells.

He backed up as fast as humanly possible, not really caring that he was going to have bloody knees because – _Ow._ He'd just kneeled in some broken glass, hadn't he?

Neville swallowed, inspecting her with twitchy eyes. "Are you all right?"

Pansy glowered at him and ripped some of the oak leaves from her head. "_Fine._ You absolute git."

Neville frowned. "Git? I'm not the one who—" He gasped when she turned her head to survey the damage to her robes, which were admittedly much nicer than his own, even though they were the same regulation uniform.

"You're- you're bleeding." He pointed out in an awkward motion towards her neck.

Dark rivulets of blood were sinking down into the pristine white of her collar. Pansy gave him a panicked look and clapped a hand around her neck, pulling it back to find it coated in red.

"Oh hell," She breathed. "I've been killed. _I've been killed!_'

"Um, it's not _that_ bad." Neville shifted closer, trying to make out the cut. It was a slice not too deep on her neck, obviously a flesh wound from one of the flying pieces of mirror. A chill ran up Neville's spine and he gingerly took a largish piece of the glass between his thumb and forefinger, holding it out to her.

"See?"

"That's odd," She whispered, holding her neck in a white-knuckled grip. "I can't see it."

"Er," Neville shifted even closer and tilted the bit of glass a different way. "It's right there."

"I mean, my…" Pansy had a wide eyed vacant look about her, her lips had suddenly gone ashy. "My reflection."

The blood from Neville's face drained.

"What in the—What's gone on?" Professor Vector stood at the head of the corridor, strict scowl etched into her features. Everyone knew she ruled the seventh floor. Some even rumoured she'd scribbled bits of complex Arithmancy in the stone that allowed her to spy.

"Is it safe?" She asked in a withered tone and came closer, boots crunching on the twinkling bits that covered the flooring.

"Wait, Professor," Neville jumped up waving his arms. "The mirror, she can't—"

"Miss Parkinson," Vector's upper lip curled, surveying the area. She waved her wand and in one unimaginably slow second, Neville watched her banish the mirror shards leaving the stone floor dull and lifeless once more.

"Detention."

"Pardon?" Pansy exclaimed. "Are you serious? I've to go to the infirmary and report the little bastards who—"

"Detention!" Vector announced even louder and shot up a shower of sparks that every student knew heralded the Headmaster, or in this case, Headmistress McGonagall.

Pansy stood gobsmacked before the old woman yanked her by the arm and they were gone down the stone steps, leaving Neville staring after them, his mouth dry.

* * *

><p>"I heard Pansy Parkinson started a fight in the seventh floor corridor last night and she's got some sort of awful curse on her!"<p>

"Really?"

"Yes, she destroyed a centaur statue by the painting of that goblin, you know— the one that was charmed blue—"

Neville set down his book bag behind the bench and took his seat. His brow creased as he reached for a piece of toast.

"Look! There she is, the absolute cow."

Neville chewed the dry bread slowly, listening to his classmates. His brain fizzled underneath his slightly scruffy bed hair.

"She doesn't look much different. Shame."

"How should someone with bad luck look, exactly?" Neville asked before he even realized he'd opened his mouth and said too much.

The two gossiping Gryffindors looked at him then spared each other a glance.

"You shouldn't have helped her." Vicky Frobisher, told him with a certain sincerity about her. The fact that she'd been calling someone a cow a few moments before didn't seem to stir her sweetness.

"Not at all! Great hero, pushing her out of the way like that." Cormac crowed from a bit further down the table near the sausages, causing Vicky to look put out. Not just people from Neville's class were repeating years, it seemed. He smiled a bit in gratitude even though the word 'hero' made him flustered.

Cormac went on, "A curse is a lot more deserving than some antlers."

Vicky's friend Eloise snickered not so surreptitiously behind her pumpkin juice. "She'd have looked better with antlers."

Neville's face fell.

"Still behaving like ickle firsties I see." Dean appeared and took a seat next to Neville. "Jealous and catty so early in the morning!"

The two girls and Cormac sent the Dean a glare before warily going back to their own business.

Neville grinned and Dean thumped him on the back before waving his wand in a kind of invisible loop the thrusting it forward as if he were casting a fishing line. He tugged and a plateful of scrambled eggs slid towards them on the rope-like charm that extended from the tip of his wand. The plate jerked forward and Neville had to catch his glass before it rattled onto its side.

"Sorry, mate, still practicing that one."

"You'll get it." Neville smiled.

Harry, Ron, and Hermione found their way to the table as well, creating a comfy bubble of familiarity at the breakfast table.

They were welcome faces. All of them hadn't been to school all the year before, but Neville was glad they had decided to come back now. It was harder now, being the leftovers that were trying to hang onto Hogwarts. All the other Gryffindors in his year had left. In fact, many of the older students in all of the Houses hadn't bothered to return to school. A lot of families had moved away, and while he had become friends and confidant to a whole slew of students, friendship under duress wasn't the same thing as easy familiarity.

He chanced a peak at the green and silver table across the hall. Slytherin house seemed absolutely empty compared to the years before.

Neville thought he'd done all right in his classes despite the whole evading torture and freeing-the-students Dumbledore's Army thing. He had planned to start his apprenticeship with Professor Sprout this year and not worry about getting his other NEWTS. That had been the plan, up until Gran had looked him over directly after the battle, covered in scars and blood and dirt, and told him he'd make a fine Auror just like his parents.

Dean took a bottle of ketchup and poured it all over his eggs causing Harry to make a sick sound. "There's a cure for that curse isn't there? I heard she'd broken a mirror."

Well at least it seemed like the Hogwarts grapevine had produced some accurate fruit.

Dean chewed his eggs before speaking. "Like some old wives' tale. You have to wait an hour for every piece of the mirror then bury them in a grave, or something like that."

"Soubs like _rubbish_ do bee. You coub be huck _counting_ duh beeches dor _seven bears!"_ Ron didn't chew before talking, which earned him a look of reprove from Hermione.

She frowned before interjecting like she always did when she had information to impart. "Actually I think the cure for breaking the spell of seven years bad luck required the victim to wait _seven_ hours before even picking up the pieces. Then the unlucky individual would have to bury the glass shards outside under the moonlight."

Everyone stared at Hermione like her name was Luna with that completely random bit of muggle knowledge. Although the actual Luna was sitting next to Ginny a few plates away.

Luna just smiled, dreaming eyes watching the ceiling obviously seeing something no one else could. She'd taken to eating at the red and gold table since the beginning of the term because all her friends were in Gryffindor. Luna didn't think belonging to another house meant that she had to distance herself from the only people she felt close to.

Most of the students still thought she was Loony though.

"Actually, wizarding mirrors are quite different." Luna said, finally bored of watching the dull stone ceiling. There were cobwebs visible and a wayward owl was rousting on one of the crossbeams. It shook itself and one small brown feather floated down through the clear air. All the magnificent magic that used to span there had broken during the battle and it hadn't weaved its way back yet.

To Neville's left, Harry gave a sympathetic groan and rubbed the back of his hair, probably remembering all the times the dorm's mirror accused him of being unkempt. Neville shook his head with a smile.

"She's right," Neville said, scraping his fork scraping against its plate. "Usually nothing happens. But in the rare occurrence of a certain clause," Neville didn't notice his voice drop a few degrees, "Seven Years Bad Luck is a real and unfortunate curse."

The other Gryffindors looked at him with varying degrees of confused faces, except Ron who was looking at his food. Hermione had a rushed expression pinching her face, like she wanted to bolt to the library and obtain a book on the subject before anyone gave away the ending.

"Oi," Ron polished off his plate. A half grin plastered itself on his face as he dropped his arm around Hermione's shoulders making her jump a bit. "Just tell us before she bursts, mate."

Neville gave a little laugh and shook his head.

"It's an old bit of magical superstition." Luna explained, sprinkling salt on her pumpkin pie. "They say the image held in a mirror is actually a piece of our soul. If you break the mirror then it's quite easy to lose that piece, which becomes trapped in the many shards of glass."

At that, Neville could practically feel Harry freeze up beside him. Ron and Hermione went from being comfortable to alert, eyes narrowed just a fraction. Ginny was watching Harry worriedly, Neville could see it out the corner of his blue eye, but the tight-knit trio offered no explanation for their sudden unease.

Luna took a taste of her dessert and made a little sound of discontent so Neville floated her the pepper shaker. She smiled with gratefulness.

"It's a tad like a portrait who doesn't like his frame, I imagine. If a piece of your soul gets lost, it could be unfortunate."

Dean and Ginny shared a look before the redhead cleared her throat. "_Could_ be?"

"Yes." Luna explained simply. "Split souls could have some advantage."

Harry shook himself out of whatever reverie had abducted him and his palm met the solid wood table with a loud slap, shaking Ron and Hermione out of their thoughts as well. "But it returns to you after seven years, doesn't it?"

Neville nodded quickly, feeling Harry's magic start to prickle along his skin. He knew it wasn't a wise idea to pry. "Yes, it comes back. Luck always finds its way back."

Harry cast his eyes away from the table at that and Neville knew the black haired wizard was better left to his thoughts.

"So what's the _actual_ clause – the part that makes you get the curse?" Dean asked.

"Oh," Luna seemed happy with the seasoning of her pie because she took a bigger bite, taking her time to chew and swallow. "I think Neville could better explain that."

Harry turned to him then with raised eyebrows. Neville hadn't noticed until that moment, but the familiar lightning bolt scar seemed faded like it never had before. He vaguely wondered if it would eventually disappear, if his own scars would disappear.

"Neville?" Harry asked, pushing the glasses further up on his nose.

Neville looked to his plate, turning the salt shaker around in his hand. "Well," He started and twisted his mouth. It had a mind of its own and didn't want to choose an attractive arrangement. It tasted like badly seasoned pumpkin pie, still sweet but tainted.

"Well, I couldn't…" He tried again. "If you look into the broken pieces and can't find your reflection, well, then the magic takes effect." He looked up to the surprised faces of his friends.

"And then you've got seven years bad luck. The only way to release yourself is to put the mirror back together again, by hand, so your reflection can return."

"That could take an awful long time…" Hermione surmised with a thoughtful expression.

"Speaking about bad luck," Ron groaned. Most students were gathering their book bags and leaving the Great Hall. "I've got to charm a reference letter out of McGonagall for the Auror program."

Neville shook his head. "I tried that before term. The Ministry has set some sort of special program. She's assigned me remedial classes instead."

"Damn." Harry had a way with words.

"Oh no." Ron rubbed his hands down his face causing him to look like he was melting. "_Remedial._ Bloody heroes of the Wizarding world and we're _remedial._"

All around them the girls laughed.

* * *

><p>TBC...<p> 


	2. Chapter 2

**SEVEN YEARS BAD LUCK**

* * *

><p><strong>Chapter 2 ~ Misery Loves Company and Bad Luck's a Stalker ~<strong>

* * *

><p>Things were going better than ever for Neville Longbottom.<p>

Every day the castle became closer to being repaired and every night Neville sat in the fixed up common room amongst his friends, enjoying the simple act of living. Sure, there was a hole in the roof above the room eight year boys shared, but it was well-behaved hole that offered a view of the night sky and water when it rained. Everything was fine, great, even.

Until he'd found it – a small piece of broken mirror, lodged in the corner of his book bag. He'd pulled out his hand and stared at the prick of blood that welled up on the tip of his finger.

Ever since that day, Neville had been watching Pansy Parkinson when their daily routines crossed paths, which admittedly, wasn't that often. He hadn't seen anything completely awful happen to her in all that time, but there had been… rumours.

Rumours that she was plagued by overwhelmingly bad luck.

Of course, not everyone believed it, even after that discussion at the breakfast table all those mornings ago. Still, the curse itched Neville in a deep corner of his brain, like the pinprick of the mirror shard in his hand. Even if Pansy Parkinson had the curse… there wasn't anything anyone could do, was there? Vector had banished the pieces…

He'd wrapped the shard up in a tissue and stuffed it in his night table, along with other keepsakes like his Quick Quote Quill that only wrote in haikus and Dumbledore's Army coin.

For the most part, life in Gryffindor tower went on.

* * *

><p>The next couple of days into term had come and gone, and while Neville missed having regular classes with the rest of the students, the Auror remedial classes weren't bad at all. In fact, Neville wasn't failing miserably in his revision like he'd imagined. He kept his marks to himself though, lest he jinx things. It'd been known to happen.<p>

"Your Auror program sounds intense." Luna told him in a quiet voice while they perused the dusty bookcases of the ancient library together.

The remedial class was a fast paced curriculum designed to squash five different core subjects necessary for Aurors into one course length: Charms, Defence Against the Dark Arts, Transfiguration, Herbology and Potions.

Ron had taken to calling it the _Remedial Auror_ (but more often _Rapidly_ _Annoying) Training Sessions_ and the name had stuck.

The ministry had sent Proudfoot, an accomplished Auror on the brink of merry retirement, to teach the gruelling course to the prodigious lonely three who'd filled out the correct applications at the beginning of the year. It just so happened that Harry and Ron were the other two.

Nevertheless, the three brave Gryffindors were getting a bit of a raw deal considering the Ministry had cut any frivolous miscellany from the texts. And anyone who'd picked up a Wizarding textbook knew just how much miscellany there could be.

Harry had been ecstatic. Neville, not so much. He'd grown fond of learning more about the asides and case studies that made up his subjects. Ron had called him a nerd. He supposed it was a little bit true.

"Until I actually sat through the class, I thought it was going to be more than I could handle." Neville replied, index finger stopping on an interesting botany text that wasn't on his list of required reading but couldn't hurt to take a peak…

"I wish everyone's classes were fast-tracked." Luna's voice sounded disembodied and the Gryffindor shut the distracting book to find that she'd already entered the next aisle.

He shoved the book back into its place and followed a long swirly finger trail left behind in the layer of dust.

"You'd dance circles around us as an Auror." Neville smiled when he found her inspecting a sunlit spot of thin air.

"You think so?" Luna wondered, poking at the air with the tip of her wand. "I'd hate being part of the Rotfang Conspiracy. Terrible thing you know, gum disease. They keep you away from your toothbrush at all hours of the day and night. You shouldn't become an Auror."

Neville couldn't help the slight frown that pulled his eyebrows together into a knot. He'd never considered himself Auror material, but he liked to think that he had been cut from the same cloth as his parents. He was so proud of being their son.

"There you go, being blunt again." Neville teased his blond friend instead of acknowledging her assessment. "Come on, I need to resist the temptation of that _Botany; Budding Believers_ text and find one that can help me with my memorization skills. I need to cram seven years' worth of five subjects in before school's end."

"And then promptly forget them?" Luna asked, a barely there eyebrow raised.

"I don't need a book for that, no." Neville smiled sheepishly, rubbing the back of his dark brown hair.

"_Why does it have to be seven years?"_ Came a low hiss of desperation that ghosted past Neville's ears.

There was a rushed whispering that followed and Neville heard one of the wards on the Restricted section activate before someone cut it down with a sharp tongued spell.

Neville and Luna crouched, wands at the ready in a split second. They shuffled across the two aisles separating them from the dodgy cove of books and settled behind a bookcase that was so cobweb covered it resembled an acromantula nest.

There was a gasp and then a nose being blown.

The two Dumbledore's Army members relaxed slightly and Neville took two books out of an eyelevel shelf to observe. To his left, Luna had done the same with some books two shelves lower.

Pansy gasped again into a silk green handkerchief. Beside her, Draco Malfoy looked at the dripping cloth in disgust.

"You can keep that now, Pans'. Pull yourself together…"

The Restricted section had couches that were centuries old, full of dust and cracks and definitely not much cushioning. Neville watched Malfoy spell one with S_courgify,_ but it didn't have much of an effect.

Pansy cleaned off an armchair with some sort of dusting charm and flopped down.

There was a loud crack and one of the ornate legs broke clear off.

Everyone winced as she landed on the floor in a cloud of dust.

She sat in the pile of splinters with shock written all over her face, ancient filth clinging to her robes and uniform.

"You really _are_ unlucky!" Another female Slytherin said, her hand waving away the cloudy air from her face.

Neville recognized her as one of the Greengrass sisters.

"Seven years." Pansy intoned in a voice that sounded like a mummy risen from the dead. "Seven years of accidents and humiliation." Her tone pitched up in desperation. "That's what I've got to look forward to!"

Malfoy grimaced and dragged her up as Greengrass set about clearing away the mess with her hand over her nose.

"Basic Arithmancy." Malfoy told the distraught girl, but it didn't look like she was listening. "It's only the most powerfully magical number_._"

They sat down on the couch, Pansy's face buried in Malfoy's shoulder.

"Three years I could have accepted." The black haired girl sniffed and pulled away with a suspiciously dry nose.

Malfoy snorted. "Only _good_ things come in threes."

Pansy ignored his comment. "I mean, it's not likely we'll be hired at the Ministry like we always planned. And that _muggle-lover_ Shacklebolt has drawn up some dastardly contracts last month… We'll have Aurors crawling all over our homes just for being from Slytherin! The next three years were bound to be unlucky!"

"If you keep talking like that, you _will_ meet your bad luck's end!" Daphne hissed from her place at the stacks, a light at the end of her wand poking through the titles.

"Come off it, Daph-ne." Malfoy added the second syllable as an afterthought with a smirk when the girl had glared. "She's just gone and got herself _the_ Seven Years Bad Luck."

He leaned back on the couch and Pansy flung herself in a desperate sort of flop to bury her face in his shoulder again. He made a repulsed face that annoyed Neville, made his nerves grate.

The white blond boy patted Pansy on her head, once. "It's a pretty rare feat. I can't even recall someone in _my_ family..."

Pansy pulled back and had an absolutely terrible expression on her face, long black hair sticking up wildly.

"Well _lucky_ me! If that idiot Longbottom hadn't pushed me—"

Neville clenched his hands against the shelving. He grit his teeth, if she hadn't been casting that particular spell he wouldn't have had to—

"If you ask me, you deserved it!" The other Slytherin girl interjected.

"Well no one _asked_ you." Pansy sneered.

"It's _your_ fault that we got sent out last year! The whole school is suspicious and don't pretend you don't know why you got attacked in the first place." Daphne said, desperate anger tingeing her words. "If you hadn't _stupidly_ tried to hand over Potter—"

Malfoy scowled fiercely, silver eyes flashing in the low light. "She's not the only one. Or did you forget about Greg? About Vince?" His voice wavered just a bit, curving around the name like a hand holding onto something precious. "Did you forget about me?"

Daphne looked down at a dusty opened text in her hands and after a moment of silence she shut it closed with a loud bang. Luna jumped and Neville had to admit his heart started pumping much faster.

The Greengrass girl was short and slight, with dirty blond hair and beady eyes. Her mouth became pinched like she didn't want to say what she had in mind but did anyway.

"No one will forget."

Neville could hear his heart thump loud against his ribcage, weighing the overheard conversation in his mind. Everyone who had been present in the Great Hall that day when the Slytherins were sent out wouldn't likely forget it. If there'd ever been a line drawn between the houses, then that day had been the final stroke.

He bit his lip, tearing at the chapped skin there. It hadn't been the Slytherins' fault. There was a whole world of people who hadn't understood what had happened – what had still needed to happen. Neville knew what it was like to not understand.

But it was difficult to imagine anyone _would _forget.

"_Everyone_ will forget." Luna's melodious voice came confident and disembodied, and Neville could have thunked his head on the bookshelf. Luna had gone and walked around the shelving, joining the Slytherin conversation.

He actually did thunk his head when a hex zoomed by his left ear.

"Luna!" Neville yelped, just as the Slytherin eighth years rounded the corner and had them flat against the dusty library stacks.

"What are you doing here?" Malfoy hissed.

"We—" Neville's heart began to race.

"The power of the number seven is based on the fact that it's the age when most people come into their magic." Luna said out of the blue, her silver eyes staring up at the ceiling.

The Slytherins shared bewildered glances. Neville had to hand it to Luna for being so bold-facedly calm with two angry wands pointed at her. Malfoy and Pansy had white-knuckled grips on theirs while Daphne stood off to the side, clutching a great big book like a shield.

"Ah," Malfoy's wand hand shuddered and fell. A twitchy smile climbed up his lips. "It's _you,_ Loony."

"Don't call her that." Neville took a step forward, putting an arm in front of his younger friend and raising his own wand. "Look, we didn't mean— Let's not have a fight about this, all right?"

Pansy sneezed and tried to hide her watery eyes behind a rather ineffective glare. "Why were you _listening?_"

Neville opened his mouth and paused, staring at her. The image of a blood-soaked collar and soft leaves falling from her face wouldn't flee from his mind. Suddenly his world had shrunk down to the size of his night table's drawer, where the piece of broken mirror sat.

He didn't have a good reason that didn't stem from the fact that he was too used to fighting or because he actually cared. And he didn't have a good reason for actually caring. Somewhere along the line he'd given up worrying about justifying his feelings because everything had been for the greater good.

He swallowed and a muscle in his chin twitched.

Luna continued speaking in that faraway voice of hers.

"It could have been three years, Pansy… It's common belief that magic rejuvenates itself in our prime years. That's the reason why we start magical training at age eleven and become adults at age seventeen. The phrase 'in your prime' comes from that too." Luna cocked her head smiled.

"But to put it simply, the curse of seven years bad luck has to be seven years long – It's in the name."

Everyone blinked.

Neville's palms felt sweaty and he moved to wipe them on his dust-covered robe. The movement caught Pansy's eye and she locked stares with him, hazel eyes smudged with dark makeup and tears. He still felt guilty about what happened to Pansy, knowing she'd been dragged off and reprimanded and probably given detention.

He'd tried to speak to Dennis Creevey and why he would attack another student, but then he remembered Colin and he could see the irrepressible pain in the younger boy's eyes…

Things got complicated when you brought a real war into schoolyard antics.

Neville swallowed again and it felt like his Adam's apple was stuck in a web. His bit his lip and was caught in her eyes like a fly in spider leg eyelashes. She looked so _afraid._

"Neville can help you." Luna answered for him. "That's why he was spying on you. He wants to help."

The Slytherins shared an incredulous look and Malfoy let out a bark of laughter. "Right. Longbottom here can slay the curse with the bloody sword of Gryffindor and save the day. You can't even spy right!"

Pansy broke eye contact with Neville and shot the blond boy a venomous glare. "Draco!"

"A sword can't help you!" Daphne supplied unhelpfully, sounding unnecessarily shrill. Her nails dug into the makeshift shield about Vampire Etiquette Techniques.

The book squealed.

Everyone took a cautious step back from it.

"No, fighting won't work." Neville shook his head and sighed. "But I do know what will. Luna's right," Pansy Parkinson had her eyes on him in a way that made him feel queasy.

"I can help."

"_What is going on here?"_

Madam Pince, raging storm in elderly witch form, descended on them from an enormously tall ladder. It went up so far that Neville couldn't see the top. Beside him, Luna didn't seem very surprised.

The old woman was glaring over their heads, straight at the three students dressed in black and green.

Neville felt an unidentifiable emotion fizzle at the back of his skull watching Pince's beady eyes.

If she tried to give the Slytherins unjust detentions, he'd fight for them because they—Oh Merlin, he'd just looked up Pince's skirt. He wanted _to die._

Neville started to cough unnaturally loud and the librarian wore a pinched look as she hopped off her ladder and brandished her fossilized claw-like hand. Everyone knew what that meant. She was going to dig into her mauve surcoat for detention slips. Rumour had it she'd given so many detentions in her first year on the job that the Headmaster would issue detention slips to her so the quota didn't overflow.

The Slytherins immediately adopted innocent faces. Daphne began to hum and stroke the spine of her book lovingly as if it would appease Pince's beastly unpleasantness.

The librarian just scowled and dipped her long-nailed hand into the pocket but came up dry. She'd obviously used them out for that week.

"Lucky for you lot, I'm letting you off with a warning."

* * *

><p>Neville never told anyone about the confrontation in the library. He'd expected some kind of awful howler to arrive in his morning porridge, heralding his incompetence, complete with some sort of insult involving his face being incapable of looking into a mirror without blowing it up.<p>

Boom.

Love, Pansy.

Of course, Neville always expected the worse, because nothing happened.

Life went on for some nerve-wracking days. Every time he passed a student with that telltale serpent etched into their robes he felt like he was on eggshells, crunching under his dress shoes like broken glass. It was difficult to watch them; knowing Slytherin was slowly getting squeezed out.

Although Luna raised a barely-there eyebrow at him from time to time, no one made so much as a peep to him about Pansy Parkinson and her reign of bad luck. In fact, more often than not, people would thump him on the back and congratulate him on the RATS classes.

He left the Great Hall with Harry and Ron, walking behind them as they ranted about Proudfoot and his inability to speak without filling his mouth with caffeine first.

Out the corner of his eye, Neville watched the Slytherin table. Pansy Parkinson sat at the far end of the hall, head hung low. Her nice robes looked like they'd been splashed with some kind of potion or puss that stained them an awful peridot.

Neville turned his eyes to the ground, following the other two Gryffindors out, his lips a thin line.

* * *

><p>"Bloody hell, I thought being an Auror was all shield charms and defence spell work." Ron moaned as they slouched out of the classroom.<p>

Neville wiped his right hand over his face, combing back sweaty hair. Proudfoot had them writing notes nonstop for the past three hours. Neville looked dismayed at his writing hand which had pitifully curled up into ball.

"And it's not very fair that he kept Harry for longer, is it?" Ron complained further, trying to get the feeling of his hand back by shaking it about.

"He _did_ kind of…" Neville waved his curled up hand, "Have a tantrum."

"Tantrum?" Ron blinked with a bit of a gormless look. "Well, his temper is a bit… intense. Especially when people make… comments. But we're used to that."

Neville smiled and shook his head.

They turned the corner and Neville ran head first into Pansy Parkinson. She fell on her bottom, books and papers and quills spraying out from her bag all across the stone floor.

Neville gaped down at the mess. "I'm sorry!"

Pansy sneered but didn't say anything in reply, only stayed on the floor and began calling her things back with _Accio_.

Ron watched her for a moment as if he couldn't decide what to say until finally he glared down at the Slytherin like she was a foreign body not belonging to the school.

"You've got the wrong hall."

Pansy paused, eyes curtained by blunt bangs. She picked up her Herbology textbook and shoved it into the bag. "If this is the hall with Longbottom in it then I think I do have the right one."

Ron shot him an incredible look of confusion but Neville didn't have an answer and merely shrugged in one big helpless motion.

Neville could hear his heart gave a bit of a loud thump as he bent to help her up.

She eyed him suspiciously, but Neville persisted because she was here for _him_, and she eventually took his hand.

Ron snorted, obviously rapidly annoyed. "I'll see you later, Nev."

"Yeah," Neville agreed, Pansy's grip was tight. He swallowed uneasily; glad she hadn't grabbed his left hand which was still pathetically cramped. "Yeah, later."

Pansy immediately let go of him when the hallway emptied. He felt unbelievably awkward and didn't know where to put any of his limbs now that she wasn't holding on.

"Longbottom," She hissed. Her robes were back to their original pristine state except for some reason Neville noticed her skirt seemed a bit too short.

"I know where it's been banished."

His mouth fell open. "What?"

She looked him in the eye then, and she didn't look afraid and desperate like that day in the library. Her lips curled into a half-smirk, heart-shaped jaw clenched.

"The…" Neville's blue eyes darted from side to side before he leaned just a fraction closer, "The mirror?"

She nodded, once, rigid. "It's in the place where hidden things go."

* * *

><p>TBC...<p> 


	3. Chapter 3

**SEVEN YEARS BAD LUCK**

* * *

><p><strong>Chapter 3 ~ The Puzzle of Miss Mimbulus Mimbletonia ~<strong>

* * *

><p>"The Room of Requirement." Neville breathed.<p>

"Daphne's refused to see me, the bitch," Her voice was imperious, as if she were completely justified in calling someone she'd lived with for seven years nasty names. But Neville didn't exactly know Daphne Greengrass and didn't feel safe commenting.

"Draco won't go back in there… Because, it's…"

She faded off looking sour and upset, and Neville let her, knowing what she was going to say about fiendfyre and Crabbe and mistakes. It was the same reason why Harry never wanted to go back.

They met an impasse on that awkward note. The emotions on Pansy's face snarled at each other in conflict. She looked apoplectic one moment and then contrite the next. He wondered just what she was thinking about to look like she'd just gotten her hand trapped in a Venomous Tentacula until she said:

"Then there's…_you_, Longbottom." The sentence was said in a stilted fashion, as if the words didn't want to squeeze past those tight lips.

Neville nodded slowly, thinking it over. He didn't even know her, not really, apart from sharing a handful of classes with her over the years and a sprinkling of verbal abuse. He wasn't about to pretend he understood _her_, even though he understood her problem a little too much.

She had no one else. Pansy Parkinson was asking for his help. He never actually expected it to happen, but maybe, he wanted it to happen, because perhaps he could do for her what he never could…

Of course, she wouldn't actually say it out loud.

Still, Neville didn't say any of his thoughts either, and their combined silence had obviously sent Pansy into a right strop because she stamped her foot and turned on her heel.

A little knotted ball of nervous excitement spun around in his chest looking at her in that moment, storming away. He followed her with determination even as she flounced out the hallway.

"It's going to be difficult. To break the curse." He said and schooled his features to stare straight ahead when a bemused glance skimmed him over.

"Don't play mysterious with me, Longbottom." He was starting to dislike the way she said his name, like it was still some kind of joke. They walked past the Charms practice rooms filled with students doing extra practical revision after class.

"I can't go a day or night without thinking about you and your graceful hippogriffic lunges." She had a soft profile, but the smirk that grew there made it tough to appreciate.

"I imagine your offer to help me is because you've got some sort of guilt syndrome. Natural though, because really, it's all your fault."

Neville stared at her with an open mouth, flummoxed she'd tried to guilt him into helping her instead of just saying the magic words.

"Sorry, my fault?" He asked, nearly biting his tongue getting the next words out, "So you actually wanted to kill someone with that _Confringo_ you were about to let off?"

Pansy's confident mask cracked a little, red blotches flushed upon the high points of her cheeks. The corner of her mouth twitched.

"No." She continued quickly as if she hadn't admitted it, "You should have seen the look on your gormless face when you saw—"

He may have cut her off with a bit of an angry grunt. His face _wasn't_ gormless… was it?

Pansy raised an eyebrow at him then jumped to the floating staircases in one quick hop and Neville hastened to join her. Forced to loom over her on the top of the steps, he watched one elegant hand scrub at her neck subconsciously; a nervous gesture he could only assume was because of his hippogriffic lunges.

The staircase took them two storeys down and Neville squinted, scrutinizing the flash of neck he saw, remembering how it had been soaked in blood. He followed her onto the landing and Pansy stopped dead cold in her stride. Neville bumped into her nearly tripping over his own feet.

Pansy's upper lip rose in irritation, her face going red with anger. "Longbottom, you great oaf! Ugh." She averted her eyes. "This is a dreadful idea."

"Excuse me?" Neville inquired, eyebrows raised.

"You're excused." She disregarded his growing ire and continued down another set of stairs, Neville hot on her heels more out of vindication than anything thing else.

Where did she get off, instigating the longest conversation he'd ever had with her, and then expect him to feel responsible on her behalf? She didn't even have the decency to accept help like a normal person!

And who went around saying puzzling things like _'I know where it is,'_ and expected people to leap into the fray headfirst?

Slytherins.

He followed her farther still, lips pressed together in indignation. Conveniently, he ignored the fact that there sat a piece of the banished mirror in his drawer and that he was, undeniably, following her.

Because Pansy Parkinson was definitely trouble.

They passed through the curved entrance to the foyer which was laden with house regalia and tapestries that depicted a mural of the Founders and important school figureheads. The Headmistress was deep in conversation with Professor Sprout standing in front of the bit where Dumbledore had been embroidered mid-wand wave in his duel with Gellert Grindlewald.

Neville nodded towards them as he went past, keeping up with Pansy's brisk pace. The two elder witches seemed perplexed by the very sight of them.

"May I ask you a question?" Pansy enquired, suspicious-sounding as they passed the Great Hall and continued down yet more stone stairs.

Neville continued to feel baffled. "_Yes."_

Pansy stopped again, chin tilted up to look him dead in the eye. "Do you think I _deserved_ to be cursed?"

Immediately, Neville's brain pulled two dusty books away from the shelves in his mind, and he saw Dennis Creevey calling her _disgusting_ through the cracks.

Looking at her right in that moment, she didn't look it– She _wasn't _disgusting, even though he knew she had the personality of a nasty howler on legs. In reality, if one didn't know it, they'd think her rather charming and stylish. He'd actually been rather enamoured with the way she'd coyly tried to hide her love for unicorns in fourth year, except when he said as much she'd thrown a crate of oats on his new shoes.

In any case, he'd seen disgusting before. He'd seen the effects of the _Cruciatus_. He'd watched the Carrows say and do more hurtful things than simple Pansy Parkinson had ever done.

Neville squirmed, his shoes suddenly feeling much too large for him even though they actually were starting to pinch. Hollow and empty; Pins and needles.

For all her charming points, Pansy wasn't _delicate. _She was tricky and barbed, like his Mimbulus Mimbletonia, except when prodded she didn't spew Stinksap but horrible comments about people's insecurities, teeth, and hair.

Thinking about being on the end of her barbs made his stomach feel bizarrely like a pit of Devil's Snare, clambering all over itself for something to choke. Still, she didn't…

"Of course you don't deserve it," He said down to his throbbing feet.

A group of Slytherin students marched behind them, their eyes illuminated by the torches and shadows more like smoky designs in the low light. Since when had they made it to the dungeons?

"Oh good." Pansy swiftly agreed, Cheshire grin curling up under that turned up nose. If it were possible, the words that came out sounded more conceited than ever. "I've been meaning to hear for myself just how sappy you could sound."

"I do a fair impression." Neville said abruptly, feeling like he'd been made the fool. A frown knotted itself into his forehead and used his longer stride to take a step in front of her, making Pansy stop and pay attention.

"Fancy showing me your take on being polite?"

Pansy's face went blank and Neville could tell he'd embarrassed her when the younger students began to titter from behind.

All of a sudden, Pansy whirled around and brandished her dark stained wand at the snickering group. "You've got five seconds before I start hexing your tongues into horns!" She shrieked. "_Especially _you, Astoria."

The underclassmen stopped laughing at her but glared instead, exchanging some whispers, staring over her shoulder and straight at Neville who immediately felt awkwardly misplaced.

Pansy didn't notice and started waving her wand.

"Hey—" Neville began but the younger Slytherins darted forward, purposely bumping into the two of them so he and Pansy had to squish against the portrait of Headmaster Basil Fronsac who obviously didn't take too kindly to his acrylic being rubbed up against by flesh and robe.

Pansy gave a wordless snarl towards the girl she'd singled out and Neville swore that one swarthy little Slytherin boy had kicked him in the ankle. He eyed them wearily as they disappeared down the hall and rubbed his leg against the back of his calf.

"Password!" The crotchety old portrait said right into Neville's ear. Pansy grabbed his elbow and dragged him past a blank length of wall with gray stoning until they went around the bend.

"So the offer's been retracted, is that it?" Pansy asked, voice going high pitched and echoing off the dingy walls. "Only brave enough to help Slytherins when _you've got an audience?"_

"No!" Neville said louder to counteract her shrillness. "I said I'll help you!"

Well, he hadn't exactly meant to shout it out like that. It was counterproductive to Pansy finding her good manners.

Pansy bit back whatever Stinksap had been on her tongue and instead said, "It's happened to you, hasn't it? You had the curse."

It felt like the ground had dropped away from his feet.

Neville swallowed the action difficult because his Adam's apple felt like it'd grown to the size of a cantaloupe instead.

"Who—" His voice cracked. Merlin, the embarrassment!

Pansy didn't let him finish and drilled a finger into the middle of his chest. "You as good as much as told me yourself! Thought I couldn't figure it out? You didn't see your stupid face, when I found I couldn't—"

She went a little green, as if remembering the haunting sensation of looking into mirror and not finding a reflection was as repulsive a feeling as Neville remembered. He waited for her ridicule to come and for the band of young Slytherins to reappear from around the bend to lead a joyous round of taunting. But Pansy only looked as sick as he felt.

He was whisked away to a spring day in 1991, playing alone in the house while his Gran hosted a geriatric exploding snap tournament in the sitting room downstairs.

Before Hogwarts, his magic had been erratic at best, non-existent at most. But somehow he'd ended up sitting on the chandelier. Neville had tried to get down, and he'd toed his way onto the massive copper frame of an antique mirror his mother had bought in a shop in Diagon Alley. She'd always collected awfully weird things, according to Gran.

And he'd slipped, grabbing the mirror in both hands but – _CRASH._

For some reason, he'd always believed he was meant to be cursed. That he deserved it somehow, because he hadn't the time or willpower to re-piece the puzzle; that he wasn't good enough to lift the curse when all he'd really needed was to speak up and ask someone for help.

"Loony Lovegood obviously knew." She surmised and Neville didn't jump to the chance to inform her of being right. "That's why she offered you up. Swotty Ravenclaws– But you didn't tell anyone else. Why?"

"I…" Neville started. "Suppose I wasn't ready to admit I've had more than my fair share of bad luck."

An unladylike snort came from Pansy's stubby nose and she rolled her eyes. Neville wished he could ward off his own bad moods as easy as that. "If I'd been you I would have told everyone. It'd have made a wonderful little scapegoat for all the idiotic bumbling you got yourself into."

"Well," Neville chewed his lip. "You're in the same position _now._ What do you want to do?"

Pansy gave his arm a smack and Neville blinked owlishly, rubbing at the stinging spot.

"I don't _deserve_ this." She concluded, and in a smaller voice, "You've got to help me."

He'd forgotten he had been waiting for those words until they washed over his ears and although purely selfish, they made the base of his skull buzz. Neville couldn't help the slight admiration that sprung up in the wake of her ambition to find a way out of the mess she'd fallen into.

And, yes. All right. He admitted it to himself. He _did_ feel slightly guilty for his hippogriffic lunges.

Neville nodded, "I _will_ help you, Pansy. We can put it back together again."

Relief at his words melted Pansy's hard expression into something softer. Neville became acutely aware that his feet were freezing and smiled back at her in what he hoped was a reassuring manner.

As if knocked back to reality, Pansy's lips thinned and she pushed past him with all too much elbow.

"Seems like chivalry isn't dead, Longbottom." She hissed over a slim shoulder, dark locks swishing. And then she stamped her way around the corner, her footsteps echoing loudly and then disappearing into thick silence save for the faint sounds of water lapping from the lake.

Neville blinked again when he met an empty hallway after tracing her steps in the dusty floor, noticing the way they ended facing directly towards the bare stone wall. Huh.

Neville rather hoped that was her way of thanking him for walking her all the way back to her house. The Gryffindor sighed and doddering old Fronsac shouted at him for a password again as he walked by.

He was going to have to climb a mountain's worth of stairs.

* * *

><p>The Great Hall was quite empty that day. Years one through four had been taken out to the grounds on a sort of field trip that, really, mostly entailed Professor McGonagall speaking about the Battle and how to cope and how to remember and other such things. The upper years received leaflets, so as not to condescend, Neville imagined.<p>

Most students hanging about had taken the opportunity of an unstructured Friday night to duck away with friends rather than sit through the rather decorous event of dinner. There was so much room at the table that Neville had a couple of books, his quill and ink pot spread out.

Because he didn't share classes with her, and his mealtimes were becoming increasingly stressful due to the number of her glares during the week, Neville decided to compose a letter on when and where he and Pansy should meet.

"Do you have a study session, Neville?" Hermione asked, obvious in her surreptitious reading over Neville's guarded elbow. "I thought we planned on going to Hogsmeade for some butterbeers Saturday."

Crumbs fell onto his message as Ron leant over his shoulder chewing a pastry of some kind and managing to use Neville's parchment as a plate.

"Study?" The redhead asked and he took a permanent seat near the whole basketful of flakey delights. "Nah, he has a date, hasn't he?" Ron looked pleased to have come up with something original and seemingly more accurate than his girlfriend.

Neville flinched and grew red in the cheeks, hastily scratching out _Saturday_ on the odd little note. He'd forgotten that the first Hogsmeade weekend had happened upon them so quickly. Surely it wasn't a good idea to try and step in between a Slytherin and their freedom to covert about the quaint village.

Hermione perked up, poking Ron in the gut so he'd lean back and resume eating over his own placing like a normal person. Neville breathed a sigh of relief only to cease up again as Hermione sank her teeth in as well.

"You can bring her along to the Three Broomsticks too." She gave him a warm smile, and Neville felt a bout of laughter wanting to lurch out of him. But he was sure Hermione wouldn't have taken too kindly to her suggestion being laughed at. No matter how ridiculous it sounded.

Neville was glad that she and Ron had somehow blessedly gotten together during the battle at Hogwarts. He didn't understand _how_ it had happened, but it'd been a thankless burden to watch their bickering and dancing around mutual feelings for the long seven years prior. Only now, the rest of their friends had to contend with the very real threat of matchmaking. Apparently belonging to a relationship meant that everyone else had to as well.

"You do have a date, don't you?" Ron mumbled around the flakes. "That's what Pansy Parkinson wanted."

"What?" Neville yelped, slamming a hand down atop the bit of parchment only to upend the quill and ink into a bowl of sugar.

Hermione was so flabbergasted she didn't spell away the mess. "What?" She took a deep breath. "Oh, _Neville._"

If saying his name like _that_ was supposed to tune him into the veritable cacophony of long-winded things Hermione could say, it very well did not.

"It's not that at all." Neville mumbled, barely containing his horror. "I'm showing her the Room of Requirement."

Ron raised a water goblet in triumph. "See? It starts. Though you'd think a girl more pleasant would try for you Nev, you're a RATS student now, you are."

"Stop." Neville tried but once Team Hermione and Ron got started there was no stopping.

"Are you sure?" Hermione placed a hand on his shoulder and reassured, "You haven't been feeling random spasms of guilt? Arbitrary feelings about wanting to mend things?"

Neville needlessly crumbled the little note into a ball.

"Did you _read_ your leaflet?" Hermione inquired lightly.

"No!— Er, well yes." He shook his head. "I'm to help Pansy mend her mirror."

"Is that what it's called now?" Ron asked happily from behind his trophy goblet. Hermione shushed him with a glare.

"And I did read the leaflet."

"Hmm." Hermione didn't seem convinced but her train of thought derailed when Harry arrived at the table with a tired grin and windblown hair.

"Hey, I'm famished." Harry took a seat and seemed it great spirits.

"Where were you?" Ron asked idly, handing over the basket that was now looking quite empty.

"Flying on the pitch." Harry answered. "First time since maybe sixth year. I can't remember the last time I got to play a good round with someone else."

"And that'd be a certain keen Quidditch player we know, would it?" Hermione implied and she and Ron shared a deceptively sweet look. Neville began nestling the books and quill in his bag, leaving the ink pot as a lost cause.

"We know lots of players." Harry replied agreeably, probably wise to their game.

"Hang on there!" Ron caught the back of Neville's jumper and pulled him back before he managed to free himself from the bench.

"We can't let you go this alone, Nev." Ron continued. "You've got to have strategy. This is like war. You've got to have a _plan_."

Neville groaned. Since when had Ron gone from being rapidly annoyed with Pansy Parkinson to bona fide love guru? The _idea_ of it all.

"_We_ never had a plan." Hermione mentioned in sotto tones.

Harry blinked behind wire frames. "For what?"

Neville opened his mouth to tell them, like he'd _planned_ on, really, because he wasn't going to lie since there wasn't anything to lie about. And he most certainly wasn't going to try and evade the other Gryffindors' questions since he wouldn't be able to keep it up for very long and that would make the effort all for naught.

"Room of Requirement." He said, eyes drawn to the big ink stain on the table. "I've to meet Pansy there to find her banished mirror."

"Hang on," Harry told him. "I'm not letting you go in there alone."

"Aw, don't hash his fun. Pug-nosed and abusive it may be, but still, fun."

"You're awful, Ronald Weasley."

"_You_ think she's a troll!"

There was an unladylike snort. "Troll is too light a word. But that doesn't give you licence to—"

And so the epic battle between Hermione and Ron continued.

"Better get that parchment out," Harry opened Neville's bag. "You've got to take down that note. You can even borrow my new owl."

Neville privately thought that maybe, possibly, his luck hadn't been the product of a seven year old curse.

Perhaps he was just naturally _doomed._

* * *

><p>TBC…<p> 


	4. Chapter 4

**SEVEN YEARS BAD LUCK**

* * *

><p><strong>Chapter 4 ~ Going Around in Circles with Two Left Feet<strong>

* * *

><p>So as it came down to it, an hour or so past lunch on Saturday afternoon, Neville showed up on the seventh floor.<p>

Only thing was, Harry Potter was waiting for him.

"Harry," Neville greeted with building dread.

The dark haired Gryffindor only straighten up and tipped his head. "I told you before. I don't want you to go—"

"Alone, yeah." Neville secretly wished Harry just… wasn't _Harry_, so he could get out of this mess gracefully. It wasn't every day that Harry took interest in Neville's exploits, and while he was happy to have support, he couldn't see the exact reason why he'd need it.

Neville hadn't exactly specified to Pansy that the Boy Who Lived would be tagging along and didn't want to know how much more stubborn prodding he'd have to do to get her barbs down this time.

But he found his worrywart attitude proven pointless when they heard footsteps and saw Pansy walking woodenly, right next to Draco Malfoy.

Neville steeled himself, but couldn't help feeling frazzled. He could _see _the blond Slytherin's eyes scour Harry up and down. Ron had been right. This _was_ war.

"No one asked you to bring a date, Longbottom." Malfoy sneered with sarcasm so blatant it failed to be funny.

Irony wasn't popular in comedic acts either. Because Pansy had in her hands a handsome bouquet of roses and the pair of them were dressed in perfectly cut dress clothes, all in black.

Harry bristled. "No one invited _you_ either."

Neville felt somehow disappointed in Harry's words and also irrationally lied to; because Pansy had said Malfoy wouldn't come and he'd believed her.

Still he nodded and greeted them both with a smile which Malfoy simply ignored, so Pansy made an angry motion and may or may not have stamped on Malfoy's foot. The blond gracefully didn't let it show and he roughly shrugged out of Pansy's grip to carry out the motions in order to make the door appear.

"Malfoy's up to something." Harry mumbled from the left. "I knew I was right."

Neville tried to catch Pansy's eye as Malfoy paced, vaguely hoping if she turned that vex stare on him she could rattle off her displeasure at the situation. _That_ would let him know she was okay. But she didn't meet his gaze.

The door materialized and then she was clutching at Malfoy's arm in a claw-like manner that looked painful, bouquet thrust forward almost like a guard, and Neville almost wished he could take a picture and show it to Ron and Hermione to proudly make a point.

They threw open the door and found themselves bathed with stark whiteness. One by one, shielding their eyes they went in and the door swung shut behind.

* * *

><p>Harry whipped his head about, scanning for disturbance, wand out in the completely sterile room.<p>

"It's…" Harry started but trailed off with an airy expression that parted his lips. "Like King's Cross."

Neville lifted an eyebrow at that particularly bizarre comparison.

"Completely empty." Neville added and surveyed the room after blinking back his sense of sight. "Like a tomb."

"It _is_ a tomb." Malfoy said, monotone from behind. He and Pansy stood near where the entrance had been, their all-black outfits standing out in stark contrast. Pansy's fingernails dug into the bouquet's stems. It was only after she'd mangled the roses that Neville noticed Pansy staring ahead in dread, her lips puffy and cheeks hollowed.

"Pansy?" Neville asked. "Are you all right?"

"I wouldn't bother." Malfoy replied for her, looking visibly shaken and sombre, like a phantom in the pure white room.

"She was hit with a Mimblewimble this morning. Tongue's all curled up." Malfoy explained. "If you'll excuse us."

Malfoy dragged Pansy forward like she was his ball and chain, small feet seeming to want to stay bolted to the floor.

Neville and Harry shared a confused glance and in unison they tailed them with brilliant displays of remedial Auror stealth.

The two Slytherins stopped in the middle of the white room and Draco Malfoy nodded to Pansy, who was biting her lip and then kneeling, placing the bouquet down in a curious gentle gesture.

Oh.

Neville stopped short, sucking in a breath and holding out a hand to stop Harry.

Malfoy pulled a velvet pouch from his pocket and handed it to Pansy. The pouch was upended and out poured a collection of dark smooth stones.

Harry looked at him, perplexed.

Neville shook his head. "Runic stones. They're saying good-bye."

They watched Pansy arrange the stones in the form of a pentagram and Malfoy produced a wand from his pocket, waving it over them murmuring a soft incantation. The casting created a wisp of blue-purple light in the shape of a circle and it spiralled down to encapsulate the arrangement causing it to glow.

Neville swallowed and bowed his head. He raised his wand along with the Slytherins, letting a tiny ball of light bounce its way past Pansy's head into the circle, messing up her hair.

He watched the three glowing globes dance for a brief moment, the dazzle shining off Pansy's dark tousled hair in a kaleidoscope show of lights. The circle flared up, faded away, and Pansy stood up leaving the stones where they lay.

Neville's fingers curled lightly around the tissue-wrapped piece of mirror that resided in his trouser pocket. He grabbed Harry by the elbow and led him back to the doorway, its outline barely visible against the whiteness. He threw it open and the Slytherin couple walked out behind them. As the familiar damp Hogwarts air met his nostrils, Neville took a deep cleansing breath and the door on the blank wall disappeared once more.

"What was all that about?" Harry asked, green eyes full of frustrated confusion.

"Seriously. The Chosen One can't even _pretend_ to care about _basic_ Wizarding customs? No wonder you've been re-admitted as remedial."

"F-For V-Vincent." Pansy supplied, and her face was a mess, some kind of black gooey makeup running down her flushed cheeks. She looked vexed beyond words at her stammer, but that was a common after-effect of the tongue-tying curse.

It wasn't anything to be ashamed of. Neville sent a smile of reassurance towards her and she ignored him.

"Oh _finally_. You've got your tongue untied." Malfoy muttered, not a glance spared for the rest of them. "Good luck." He said and then his lip curled up as if he were funny. Seriously, Malfoy was never funny.

Pansy thumped him in the arm and glared.

"Yeah, Yeah… I know." Malfoy said. The side of Pansy's hair was still tangled from where the ball of magic had zipped by her ear and Neville felt the inexplicable urge to smooth it for her since it had been his fault.

Malfoy reached out and his pale hand ran down the crown of her head, flattening the near black strands into place.

"Chocolate frogs."

Neville crushed the tissue wad in his pocket. Why was he helping her again? She wasn't even nice.

"Malfoy." He heard Harry say but the blond just stared back balefully before turning on his heel and stalking down the hallway.

Harry took off after him.

Neville could have laughed at the irony, but he was staunchly against irony at the moment. Maybe later.

Pansy was glaring at him. "Right." She said, and a tiny smirk lifted her lips at the solid word. "Let's get the bloody mirror."

She had to cluck her tongue three times to help un-stick it and Neville dutifully trudged back and forth.

* * *

><p>The Room of Hidden Things, otherwise known as the Room of Requirement, had been burned up by an out of control fiendfyre spell cast by Vincent Crabbe during the Battle of Hogwarts. Before being set on fire, that specific room, the place where hidden things went, was an overstuffed stale smelling unfortunate mess. If one could actually compare it, they would have to say it was like their home's <em>worst<em> closet multiplied by a thousand and put together in one cramped space.

Books used to tower in swaying piles, lurching back and forth and threatening to tip over. Broken furniture had been wedged into every crevice and there used to be whole ponds of parchment of old failed essays that had been banished in hopes of making the grade disappear.

But when Neville and Pansy walked in, it was merely a messy room.

He noticed Pansy fiddling with the cuff of her sleeve and she raised it to swipe underneath one eye. It made no sense to ruin her nice coat.

"Hey, Pansy, here." He frowned and pulled out the crumpled tissue wad and she looked at it with a turned up nose (well her nose was always turned up a bit), but he unwrapped it, letting the piece of mirror fall out onto his palm before handing it over.

She sniffed, eyeing him like he'd transformed into one of Hagrid's pets before snatching the crumpled thing and rubbing away the mascara mess in hasty swiping motions. Neville privately wanted to tell her she'd made one eye look worse, but kept it to himself. The only mirror in this room would be the one she couldn't see herself in.

They walked farther in and along the way he kicked at random things found in their way; the handle half of a broken wand, an old broomstick that was missing most of its bristles, a couple pounds worth of candy wrappers and – Neville tried to pull the string on a gilded lamp with a rather frilly lace shade but it broke off in his hand.

_Lumos_ was cast and it shone bright and strong. He stooped to root through a pile of parchment – stacks of failed essays from the first and second years' potions class.

Neville shook his head, amused. He'd always gotten that question on Armadillo bile hopelessly wrong too.

"Looks like the hiding has begun again." He lifted his chin and Pansy had her wand out, casting _Accio._

A sparkling stream of glass flew up from behind and Neville just barely shot up a shield charm before Pansy got herself minced. She gave a rather girlish shriek when the shards clattered around her feet onto a cushioning charm. No use in risking the bloody thing becoming dust.

He wanted to roll his eyes, because who summoned broken glass and didn't protect himself? But he refrained because he was here to help, not be impolite.

Just so happened that Pansy rolled her eyes for him. "I could have handled that." She said frostily.

"Just be glad I didn't lunge." Neville replied, and Pansy toed him behind the knee angrily. Ron had been right again. This was bound to turn out abusive. He grit slightly oversized teeth and soldiered on.

At the odd interval, random broken and unwanted things appeared at various points of the room. Obviously people were hiding the dirt under their rugs more often than necessary. No wonder the room had been squashed to the brim. Maybe burning it all had been an act of good, in the end.

They cast Accio a couple more times just to catch any stragglers and ended up with a glittering pile of bad luck.

"Can we cast a reparation charm now?" Pansy said anxiously, peering down at the heap.

"No." Neville could practically _see_ Pansy's heart drop, knowing this wasn't going to be an easy fix.

"The proper way to release you from the curse is to put the mirror back together by hand. Bad enough it's been hexed and banished and summoned already. It doesn't matter what we do, as long as it gets done without magic."

"It's near _dust,_ how am I supposed to do that?" Pansy screamed. "Merlin, I had to go and hex the bloody mirror didn't I? You! And your stupid heroic— and _I'm_ a clumsy bi—"

"We need to spread it all out, to start off with. What shape was it before?" Neville found himself frowning and shook his head with more force than necessary as he cut her off. Why in the world would she insult herself too?

There was a pause as Pansy recollected her sanity. "An ugly rectangle, I think."

Insulting _shapes_. She was back on form.

"That's easier then. We can find all the edge pieces and make a frame. It shouldn't be that hard." He toed the sad heap. "See? Some of the pieces are quite big."

"Piece by piece then." Pansy sighed, resigned, horrified.

They stared at the pile.

_POP!_

Out of nowhere apparated a crate full of spoiled asparagus right next to Pansy's head. It fell about an inch away from crushing her small feet, startling them both badly.

"Why don't people use a bloody _bin?_" Pansy raged, kicking the blasted thing. Neville watched with a wide eyed expression as her shoe got entangled in one of the vents and when she yanked her foot back— the heel ripped off.

"FUH—" She cursed in mid fall but Neville reached out lightning fast and steadied her, causing the word to fall away instead.

Looking shaken, Pansy had a scowl worthy of the late Professor Snape etched into her face.

"I'm not working here." She said in a prim manner. The tissue had been shredded and lay in a tiny ball on the floor. "One more mishap like that and my luck's as good as smashed."

"You're right. This isn't any good..." Neville said is a low voice. A packrat room like this would be a disaster waiting to happen for someone with terrible luck.

"Absolutely. I wish this awful room had disappeared." Her voice was stony, but then she looked up at Neville and he could see her eyes were glassy. He supposed it was difficult to remain standing tall when left with only one proper shoe.

He knelt down and carefully picked up the heel. Might as well mend _something._

Neville took a seat on the crate and a couple of errant asparagus stalks rolled out making them both wrinkle their noses.

"Give me your shoe. Proudfoot taught us a good gluing charm the other day."

"I'm not putting my feet on this floor." Pansy gasped, scandalised. "There's rotten veggie juice all over, not to mention _glass. _Are you daft?"

Neville kindly did _not_ mention how she'd almost grated off her skin earlier.

"All right." He patted his knee. "Foot up then, so you can walk out of here."

Before last year he would have been a nervous wreck, offering to do something like that for someone he wasn't exactly friends with. But leading Dumbledore's Army meant he had to tie the occasional shoelace for a younger student. Still, he bit the inside of his cheek when Pansy dug her foot into the flesh above his knee.

She was still a girl, whose rippling skirt created a shadow leading up past her thigh.

Neville swallowed and trained his wand at the flat bit of the heel, letting a fat swirl of transparent liquid form on the surface. It took a moment to get tacky white and he squeezed it back into place with as much pressure as he dared, making sure to hold her foot carefully and steady.

"We've got to move this mirror." Pansy said from above him and Neville twitched, elbows feeling too large.

"Then we'll make it portable." He reassured. "Summon some of that parchment to make a huge sheet. This has got to dry a bit more before you try it."

She did as told without much complaint – small miracles – and he found himself reading the potions essays so intently to keep his eyes occupied that he was almost certain he'd memorized twenty three ways of brewing a wit-sharpening potion incorrectly.

The twenty three parchments became one with a handy Transfiguration trick – it was common practice to merge similar propertied things instead of engorge for strength's sake – and they swept the mirror pieces over top it. Pansy went over his head to hit it with a hex meant to make your teeth turn into pieces of toffee which was actually a great way to stabilize things to a piece of parchment.

"Wait, I know a good one," Neville grinned and hit the whole thing with a household spell designed to fold one's clothes. He doubt very much that Pansy used it at all when she looked impressed as the large sheet folding in on itself, mirror bits still spread out like a mosaic, forming a ledger sized packet.

"Wicked." She breathed and Neville remembered to release her foot, feeling the littlest bit foolish when she smirked knowingly at him and used his head as a hand rest, testing the state of her heel.

"You've gotten better at your spell work." Pansy said at last as she picked up the packet, finally completely composed save for that one raccoon eye.

Neville tried to shrug off the compliment, running an awkward hand through his eyebrow length hair, but the words didn't roll off as easily as he'd have liked.

* * *

><p>When Neville returned to the common room, there were mittens and coats and wet boots strewn about everywhere; a telltale indicator that the trip to Hogsmeade had been enjoyed by many Gryffindors.<p>

He weaved through the clutter of excited chattering students and found Ron and Hermione perched tentatively on a squashy crimson sofa by the window pane.

Harry immediately came up to him from the opposite side, looking cross.

"What was that ceremony?"

Neville blinked wildly at the couple, but Ron just shrugged and Hermione crossed her arms in a displeased gesture.

"It was a farewell blessing." Neville explained, wondering if he missed some kind of argument. Sometimes he forgot that Harry didn't know the most basic things about the wizarding world. And that he was stubborn as hell.

"Simplest form, really. You can draw the circle with your finger and use pond stones if you wanted. Used to do it all the time for Trevor. It's the kind of thing kids do when they lose something important."

He supposed the only funerals Harry had been to were Dumbledore's and the mass service held after the Battle. Maybe at Fred's… But no recognition sparked behind those green eyes. Most likely those ceremonies had been fundamentally the same but on a much larger scale with more spells and runes set into place a long time in advance.

"It's supposed to be a promise." Ron said, surly-faced from the side.

Harry didn't say anything else and slammed himself up the stairs towards the dormitories.

Hermione rolled her eyes and let out a mournful sigh. "_Boys._ Things never change. Malfoy got him into a huge strop."

Neville thought that beside her, Ron looked like he'd gotten himself into a right strop by proxy since he was hugging that throw cushion in a decidedly churlish grip.

He sat down beside them and summoned his sixth year Transfigurations text from underneath his bed. Proudfoot was starting up revision on Animal to Inanimates and if he didn't refresh he was going to utterly embarrass himself. He only wished the Auror had a more linear approach to teaching five subjects in one.

The couple got up, obvious now that they'd been waiting for his return in order to interrogate about Harry's mood. Neville stretched out to read about fur types and fibers as they clomped up the stairs.

He heard Ron make a comment that Neville always made friends with the demented witches first, making Hermione slap him on the arm.

"He was _my_ friend since the beginning of first year!" She hissed under her breath.

Ron sounded smug and they'd reached the top of the staircase. "I know."

He heard her thump him again and then there was a scuffle and then some distinct smacking sounds and Neville hid his face between pages 1210 and 1211 of his book.

* * *

><p>TBC…<p> 


	5. Chapter 5

**SEVEN YEARS BAD LUCK**

* * *

><p><strong>Chapter 5 ~ How to Use the Three S's on a Suspect (Slytherin)<strong>

* * *

><p>"Ssh."<p>

Ron whirled around in his chair, craning his neck right into Neville's view.

A large round nose appeared at the doorway to the classroom and then Proudfoot followed behind it, plump finger held up to rather thin lips.

"SSH!" The Auror shushed them again, and Harry mouthed the word 'what?' at Neville and Ron.

They'd been reasonably well-behaved waiting for the old man to show up. Neville quickly flipped over a sheet of parchment and wrote the date on the corner, effectively camouflaging the doodles on the other side.

"Today I will be teaching you the Three S's. This is an extremely important system that every Auror in training should internalize," He raised one bushy gray eyebrow, "Lest you be caught unawares…"

The boys shared curious glances and Proudfoot waved his wand, which was plump-looking just like him. Three rolled up parchments floated to land in front of each of them. Neville wanted to groan and slump in defeat onto the table. He was exhausted, having reviewed the rabbits to rugs incantation for ages and now Proudfoot wanted to start something completely new?

"This is your special task for this week."

Ron rolled his eyes and slumped lower into his chair. "Great! More reading or copying out notes."

That was until the rolls were unfurled and the real details of their task were made clear. Ron began grinning ear to ear.

"It's to my knowledge that all three of you are from the noble house of Gryffindor." The Auror carried on not having heard the surly comment. He sipped at his coffee, humming.

Ron nodded, much more enthusiastic about being complimented in the morning, "That's right Prof Proudfoot!"

"It said so on our applications," Harry whispered under his breath to Neville who'd managed to get ink drops all over his notes and was trying to sop it up.

"Indeed." Proudfoot continued, lumbering around the head desk to sit on its edge. The sorry piece of furniture creaked ominously. "I too hail from Gryffindor. Beautiful house, yeah? The glory! The rivalry!"

Neville tried to sigh behind a well placed hand, though it was doubtful Proudfoot would hear anything other than his own spiel for next while.

"Of course, in my year we didn't win the house cup. It was those blasted Slytherins!"

"Here, here!" Ron raised his ink bottle with spirit causing Proudfoot to momentarily come back to himself, large nose twitching for more coffee. Harry kicked the back of Ron's chair.

"Uh, I mean, those nasty prats!"

"So true." Proudfoot agreed, looking a bit swept up in thinking about youthful days when desks didn't sound like they were compressing under his weight.

"Professor Proudfoot, sir," Neville raised his hand. "What has our house affiliation have to do with this assignment?"

The scroll detailed a summary of the Three S's and how to use them on a Suspect.

"While almost no other job applications require the details of your life at school except for grades, at Auror headquarters we like to know _everything_ about our applicants_._ That includes your house! Why? Well," Proudfoot thankfully eased up on the desk and moved to the slate board.

"The Three S's will help you better gauge the suspiciousness level of a suspect!" Three large chalky S's appeared in varied font on the board.

"I want you to pick one person, could be anyone here at Hogwarts, and make some notes about him; make sure to choose someone innocuous, someone curious, or ultimately, someone suspicious. Observe and report back by week's end."

The boys began to rustle their paper and Proudfoot stamped one small puffy foot to regain attention.

"And make sure you're _discreet._ The Headmistress, while a wonderful Gryffindor herself, does not take lightly the privacy of Hogwarts residents being disturbed. Though we all know that it's hard to find a bit of discreetness without an audience around these halls, don't we lads?"

Neville gulped in horror at the mental images.

"And if your charges just so happen to be doing something… _untoward_, well then, you can come to me and as a Professor I can take house points accordingly."

The well-seasoned Auror leant into Neville's personal space and the scent of coffee grounds wafted up from Proudfoot's well-worn tweed vest. "A Slytherin is the perfect suspect, you'll find."

Neville averted his eyes, disturbed.

The Auror wanted his wayward students to write a report in order to give an indication of their powers of observation. But heavily suggesting he wanted dirt on Slytherin students because of misplaced house pride? That was just… unfair.

They were to submit the reports and Proudfoot would mark them accordingly.

According to what, Neville had no idea, but it had to be an Auror trade secret or something of the like. He just hoped he did enough to pass.

* * *

><p>A wadded up ball of parchment whizzed by and <em>–splat!<em>

Landed on the back of Hannah Abbott's library chair. She was much too busy rearranging homemade flash cards with Ernie Macmillan. Having missed half of sixth year and then most of seventh was probably stressing out the blond girl more than usual.

Another flew by._ Splat!_

She didn't notice.

But Neville did.

It happened again, and again, and soon enough it looked like the back of the old hard chair had grown parchment coloured pustules. Neville put down his quill in annoyance, ready to say something to the completely immature prat launching spit wads over his shoulder.

Neville licked his lips, smoothed down the pages of the book before him and uncrossed his ankles from beneath the empty chair on the opposite side of the table. He was going to look over his shoulder and figure out who the awful culprit was and he was going to do it like an Auror.

The Three S's.

He recited them internally, trying to get them to stick. _Secrecy, Stealth and—_

_SPLAT._

"Ugh." He wiped the gooey parchment ball from his eye. "That's disgusting."

Pansy Parkinson merely chewed on another wad, sitting back in her chair at the table behind him, smirking like it was Drooble's Best Blowing Gum in her mouth instead.

Guilt trickled into Neville's left ear, making his head swim with the memory of Dennis Creevey's hate-filled words. Pansy didn't seem so bothered.

"I know." She said and smirked, spitting the next wad out so fast Neville almost didn't shield himself in time.

Almost.

It rebounded and hit Pansy straight in the nose.

"Good aim." Hermione told him in a stage whisper, not looking up from a book. She was sitting in the table next to him after all.

Classes finished for the day, many older students were stuck finishing assignments in the library atrium. Rows upon rows of small desks sat under the dusty light that filtered in from above. Surrounding the clearing were tall forest-like stacks of books and shelving reaching just as high as the ceiling. It made for an awful place to talk because the sound amplified.

No one knew for sure but it had been a long standing fear that madam Pince had charmed the section with a _Sonorus_. Luckily the underfed vulture of a woman was practically deaf in one ear or no one would have the chance to utter a word.

He subtly banished the mess so Pince wouldn't jinx the balls to stick to their faces if she came around. He twisted in his chair, elbow hanging over the back and then he banished the mess he found there too.

"What's the matter?" He asked, observing that besides a sheet of perfectly good parchment that was half shredded, Pansy didn't have much in the way of study materials. Her hand came up, rubbing harshly at her nose with displeasure.

"What are you working on there, Longbottom?" She sniped.

Neville swivelled around completely, frowning. "Auror training. Why were you throwing those?"

"It got your attention." Pansy shrugged and Neville felt a spike of exasperation. They weren't first years anymore. He glibly surveyed the premises, noting that not one of her Slytherin kin were in the area, making it more likely she would be safe enough to approach.

The Slytherin kicked out the empty chair at her table towards Neville and it made a loud screech against the floor.

Several students turned to glare at them saying "SSH."

Neville scratched at his head in mortification.

"Come on, sit down there." Pansy urged, kicking the wooden chair so that it hopped along the floor making more of a racket.

"Er…" His eyes darted from side to side. Even the Hufflepuff pair in front were looking back at him now.

Pansy ripped another piece of parchment and it sounded even louder now that it felt like everyone's eyes had turned to them.

"Oh just get on with it!" Hermione whispered angrily and shot a _Muffliato_ at the table.

Frowning superbly behind ruffled brown bangs and a blush, Neville sighed and grabbed his books, shifting them all over to the table behind. By now most Gryffindor students were whispering about his 'date' with Pansy Parkinson and there was no small amount of enthusiastic jeers and, even more horrifyingly, pitiful pleas for advice. That wasn't exactly what he'd intended by just telling the truth. Even Professor Slughorn had stopped him in the hallways and invited him to discuss his new-found pursuit of snakes.

The desks were built for two people but students rarely used them like that since they were more than squashed enough. It was also a well known fact that Ravenclaws had the tendency to retaliate if they thought their notes were going to end up under someone else's nose.

Pansy immediately snatched up his scroll.

Neville groaned when she began snickering.

"Oh, this looks fun." An eyebrow rose. "_Slytherins suggested?_ Interesting."

How he dearly wanted to take back the curled parchment but what would be the point? She'd already read the awful thing.

A horrible gleeful twinkle came to her eye. "Why don't you write about me? Think of the drama! Tragic and suspicious, and chock full of Slytherin cunning. _Pound_foot would eat it up."

Neville frowned. "Did you just make a fat joke?"

"Two, actually. Shall I _round_ it out at three?"

Neville snorted at the awful pun, lips curling back to show teeth. But just as fast he slammed a hand against his mouth, a bit appalled he'd even started to laugh.

That was until he saw Pansy Parkinson smiling.

Not snarling, not sneering, and not twisting up her mouth so it looked like something disgusting had squashed her in the face.

Just happy.

Merlin. Is that what made Slytherins genuinely happy? Bizarre. Fascinating. Horrible.

He made a mental note and chose not to comment on the revelation. Neville shook his head, answering smile not exactly faded away.

"You mean you want me to cheat."

"Is that what you call cheating?" She flicked a folded up parchment bit at him and he put it in his pocket out of habit.

"It was just a suggestion. I can come across as the sexy—" Neville sputtered at that, "illustrious suspect who has a very _bad_ secret that she mustn't tell." She grinned wickedly at his red face. "Glamorous, don't you agree?"

"Sure," Neville croaked. "Because being spied on is so glamorous."

"Dare you to find out." Pansy shook glossy hair over a shoulder and flicked another rolled up paper ball at him. "You looked about ready to die of guilt in your seat there, Longbottom."

She did have a point. He'd been sitting at that spot for well over an hour trying to figure out how to spy on someone who wasn't guilty of casting _Cruciatus_ on innocent victims. It just didn't feel necessary.

"I'm not going to make something up." He hesitated to open up his books again but Pansy didn't look like she was going anywhere so out came the Potions text.

"Who said I _don't_ have a secret?" She— did she _pout?_— and kicked him in the ankle when she moved to cross her legs. He didn't think it was by accident but felt prudent to not mention it. He didn't really know her and she could just be the owner of awkwardly large feet.

He scratched at more parchment with the dull nib of his favourite plum coloured quill only producing more silly doodles. No, he'd held her foot. Hers were Princess-sized, the smallest on the witch's podiatry scale.

"Longbottom you great lout, this potions assignment is _remedial_."

She tossed the offending booklet back into the pile before he could tell her to. Some people were so _nosy._

Neville frowned, keeping his eyes trained to the paper and kicked out, making sure his own awkward Stately Man's size feet took up all the leg room.

"How is your mirror?" He asked stiltedly.

At that Pansy became quiet, jolly viperous mood evaporating. She really did pout then, he was sure of it.

"Absolute shite."

Neville's head shot up.

"You'll have to come have a look." Pansy shrugged again only this time it was much less smug than before.

* * *

><p>"So who did you choose to spy on, mate?" Ron asked, absent-mindedly tossing a quaffle back and forth with his sister.<p>

Neville opened his mouth to answer but Ginny piped up, obviously thinking about Harry instead.

"Who do you think? He chose Malfoy." Ginny passed the leather ball back with a bit more force than necessary. Harry didn't seem to notice, making diligent notes on the back of his observation report.

Naturally when Gryffindors were discreet, everyone knew.

Ron rubbed his smarting hand against short cropped red locks. "_That_ was obvious. You couldn't _get_ more obvious by the way Harry ran him down with his broom the other day. Which was brilliant, by the way."

Harry waved a hand in acknowledgment.

"If you ask me, there _is_ something suspicious going on with the git. No one expected him to show his face back here!" Ginny exclaimed.

"We all need NEWTS one way or another." Hermione's voice wafted up from behind a wall of texts build in front of her face.

The Gryffindor common room had been stuffy and filled with a hysterical group of fifth years desperately trying to transfigure lumps of coal into mittens for a practical homework assignment. Anyone caught with sooty hands were automatic fails.

The eighth years plus Ginny sat around on the boys' beds.

"Too bad Proudfoot wanted Slytherin stories," Ron lobbed the quaffle again, and Neville watched it sail past the foot of his bed into Ginny's outstretched hands.

"I was all set to write about Hermione since I see her everyday anyway."

"That's a very lazy approach to your training." The girl in question noted from beyond the spine-filled wall. Neville could have sworn there was something by Lockhart in there.

"It's not fair is it?" Ron rolled his eyes and Neville found himself nodding in agreement. "Harry called dibs on the slimiest git and Neville's got an excuse to _observe_ Parkinson."

Neville froze and stared at his feet in silent alarm.

Ron soldiered on, "I chose Slughorn anyway. He's always got the best treats squirreled away and ever since I got poisoned, if I butter him up just right he—"

"Should we expect you to become the new King Slug, then?" Ginny began to laugh.

Neville got up.

"Off to Juliet's side of town?" Dean asked with a knowing grin.

He'd practiced this in his head, now Neville only had to execute it without saying too much. "Who? I'm off to the Greenhouses. Just a short visit, I haven't seen Professor Sprout in a while. She said there are some great new specimens…"

Just as he thought. The moment he started talking Herbology they all tuned him out.

* * *

><p>The corridors were empty and quiet hours after dinner, save for the soft snoring of Fronsac's portrait. Neville was privately happy about that, the old painting was foul-tempered and hard of hearing to boot.<p>

A couple days had passed since he'd talked to Pansy in the library. It was just the way things went around Hogwarts. Make a plan to go look at a girl's puzzle, end up not seeing her around school for nearly a week.

Neville let out a laboured sigh, watching his breath curl up in smoky designs. It was getting much, much colder now as the temperatures permeated the underground levels. He didn't know how the Slytherins dealt with it. Walking up to Gryffindor tower was bad enough when precipitation became bountiful. The winding staircases got slick with dirty water making the steep stone steps deadly to anyone without rubber soles or a good sticking charm.

The deadline to Proudfoot's assignment had closed in fast and it was looking more and more likely he'd have to make something up.

The only saving grace about this whole mess was that he knew exactly where to find a bunch of Slytherins.

He paced in front of the blank space of wall, knowing that the entrance was there, _somewhere_. But it never became revealed.

Neville sighed again and scratched a few half-hearted sentences onto his parchment, using his book bag as a hard surface. The report would be shoddy at best. So much for his new-found luck.

"She won't come out, you know."

Neville jumped, whipped around, wand outstretched and pointing to…

He sucked in a breath and apprehension fled him just as fast as it had come. Daphne Greengrass' little sister. What was her name again? Asteria?

She had a stuck up expression on her face and cat-like eyes in the low light. She hung back against the wall, leaning against it leisurely. It was like she'd popped out of it from nowhere, just like Peeves or a ghost.

"Hello," He greeted wearily.

"It's the curse." She told him in a whisper. "It's caught her!"

Neville's heart became struck with fear and before he'd known it, he was right in Asteria's face. "What's happened?" He asked, and swallowed.

"You're pathetic. She hasn't _died._" Asteria looked him up and down with disdain when a sigh of relief filled the air.

"Someone's poured Stinksap all over her bed."

Neville stood agape. He hadn't quite expected that. "Ah, er… surely the house elves can…"

"While she was still asleep in it." Asteria gave him a tiny smug smile.

"Oh," Neville shut his mouth and knew with all certainty that there had been foul play in the girls' dorms. Should he write that down?

_Foul play was observed to take place between different variations of the feminine specimens. The subjects at hand confessed to sticky substances being used as biological warfare, but out of what reasoning? Anger? Spite? Further investigation required at length, possibly inside the aforementioned bedroom._

Neville shook his head. "I know a great charm for that!"

He straightened up, feeling optimism pour back into him. "You know, I have a Mimbulus Mimbletonia myself. They're tricky little cacti…"

He trailed off noticing the girl was looking at him blankly, like she hadn't understood a word he said.

"Perhaps," He tried again, slower. "You could let me come in? I can help her."

The Greengrass girl immediately became alert, eyes narrowed. "Fat chance." She looked him up and down. "And in your case…"

"I'm not fat." He said numbly, wondering how he'd even gotten into this conversation. "I'm big-boned and your puns need work. Look, if you could just," He made to walk by her but she gave a shriek and flung her arms out wide.

"No outsiders!" She shouted.

"Nonsense, let the boy in!" He thought he could hear Slughorn's voice from beyond the wall. "Why I remember, back in my day, there was this dame from Ravenclaw, beautiful, you know and I—

"Are you mad?" A chorus erupted. It sounded like there was a whole crowd standing a few feet before him that he couldn't _see._ It was disorientating.

"Well put _Pansy_ outside then! She smells like the backside of Filch's cat. Cor'… d'you think Gryffindors _like_ that?"

"Ew! Have you been sniffing his pus—uh oh…" There was a scuffle.

"I'm going to hex your tongue into a horn, Baddock!" That one had definitely been Pansy.

A hand shot out of the wall and shoved the Greengrass girl aside, revealing Draco Malfoy.

"Oh, it's you." Malfoy said, not even bothering to apologize to the younger girl he knocked out of the way whilst stepping out of the wall. Her eyes seemed to go dotty and wide and– Oh. Neville edged away, finally deducing her ailment. She was completely besotted.

"Pansy is screaming at anyone who goes near her, so I wouldn't stick around if I were you. Not that anyone wants to be next to her with that stench."

Neville nodded. He couldn't count the number of times he'd accidently gotten coated with the stuff when first receiving the plant from his Great Uncle. Or the number of times his housemates had been the wily thing's victims.

"I know a charm," He started again but Malfoy crossed his arms and raised an eyebrow.

"The House of Slytherin is meant for Slytherin eyes only. Why do you think you can't see our door?"

Neville squinted at the wall, knowing Malfoy was probably right. To him, it looked like the Slytherins faded in and out of the stones like a ghost would. He'd assumed it was just a secret passage, but if their House door was right there then he supposed he _did_ need a seed of Slytherin ambition implanted in his brain to see it.

That, or Malfoy was full of it and that was just a very, _very_ powerful disillusion spell.

_The wild pansy's brethren believe in delusions of grandeur. The belief is so strong that they borderline on the effects of confuding or memory charm abuse. The delusions are then used as fodder for insulting anyone who will listen._

The white-blond Slytherin turned to Asteria and raised his other eyebrow. "Astoria, you heard her. Hex town for anyone who calls_ him_ names." He jerked his head towards Neville and the Gryffindor tried to feel warmed by the sentiment (but found it difficult to like the idea of people being hexed because of him).

He picked up the forgotten schoolbag. The other shoe always managed to drop, right about—

"You know she hates to share her toys." Malfoy eyed him then with one smarmy gray eye and smirked.

Neville gripped his bag tighter and nodded. "Right. Well, give her my regards then…"

* * *

><p>The next day he submitted the finished scroll.<p>

…_the wild pansy's brethren believe in delusions of grandeur. The belief is so strong that they borderline on the effects of confuding or memory charm abuse. The delusions are then used as fodder for insulting anyone who will listen._

_Apart from believing itself to be glamorous and secretive, the wild pansy takes enjoyment in the act of insulting others for the sake of humour (refer to section Three, A; Laughing Pansies and Where to Stick Them). Early assumptions indicate that these comedic attempts are meant to be harmful like thorns or barbs to cause pain to those unfortunate enough to be in the vicinity. However, after further consideration and observation, it is clear that this is merely a ritual way of presenting the following qualities: superiority, comedic talent, and a keen sense of weakness in others. If you've been pricked by a wild pansy, chances are you were a stepping stone to build its own self worth and personal feelings weren't considered. That's not to say that one should forgive the wild pansy, but some could argue that a rose without thorns is a rose without beauty. A wild pansy without its usual barbed insults and unnecessary hexing is not a healthy wild pansy. Expect to be around a prickly specimen but strive to find a way around the rough spots._

_The wild pansy makes its home in the dungeons behind a hidden entrance in a blank stone wall two lefts from the Potions corridor. A strong disillusion charm is placed across the entrance so that specimens without the correct breeding pattern cannot enter. After suffering acts of bullying and random bouts of extremely bad luck (refer to section Five, C; Foul Play in Boarding School Dormitories), the specimen has become less likely to act with cunning and gained more potential to seek help outside of its house. Further digging is necessary to get to the roots of the specimen's behaviour. More observation is required before any action can be taken._

_In short, Slytherins are not necessarily lacking in bravery or tact but merely lacking in emotional punctuality. _

* * *

><p>TBC...<br>To everyone who's following this story, thank you for reading and reviews totally spur me on, major thanks!


	6. Chapter 6

**SEVEN YEARS BAD LUCK**

* * *

><p><strong>Chapter Six ~ Five Thousand and Two Reasons to Give Up ~<strong>

* * *

><p>If Neville had learned anything from Auror Training, it was that he would never ever be able to prepare himself for the next day's work.<p>

Maybe that was part of Proudfoot's distinguished Auror plan. Maybe he'd known all along that keeping the three boys on their toes was the proper way to introduce the idea that One Couldn't Be Prepared for Everything.

Then again, it could have been because Neville was getting fed up of revising (while Harry and Ron enjoyed their evenings) and then turning up to class exhausted only to find something completely erroneous on the chalk board.

So it was with that lesson in mind that Neville found himself with a lot more free time and less shadows under his eyes.

It also meant that he finally had the chance to investigate the state of Pansy Parkinson's mirror. He just had to Three S's his way into her path.

They shared meal times together.

The only problem with that was… well. Some things just couldn't be done with prudence.

Taking fat gulps of air to steal himself against the humour his classmates had so viciously found in the predicament, he rose from his seat leaving his possessions and robe behind at the bench.

A group of girls at the edge of Gryffindor table began a round of tittering. The sound of giggles and snickers passed like a horrible airborne illness to the next table, and the next, and then finally he was standing at the edge of Slytherin.

Really it shouldn't have mattered that he was going over there to talk to another student, but minding other people's business was the well-known unlisted subject on Hogwarts curriculum. It also didn't help that unlike any other year before, for some odd reason, people actually knew his name.

Standing there, looking down the table in search of Pansy Parkinson's face made him feel more out of sorts than that time he'd been turned into a canary. He spotted her partway down the middle and marched quickly, though he was absolutely positive it was Malcolm Baddock who managed to spill gravy down his trouser leg hem as he passed.

Neville groaned and _Scourgified _at it as he walked, but nothing quite got gravy out.

"Longbottom." It was Malfoy who spoke, a few seats down from Pansy who looked about ready to drown in her pudding.

"Pansy," Neville said, hoping there was room in that dish for two. "Will you please meet with me in the library after supper?"

A few taunts and catcalls came from behind. He shifted his footing, feeling the gravy squishing around in his sock.

Pansy quickly took a spoonful of the pudding to avoid having to answer. Neville contained a suffering sigh at her well-timed manners.

"Oi, Longbottom!" Malfoy tried again, louder. "Looks like you're unwanted! Oh, wait," Malfoy stretched back like the cat that got the cream. "_That's_ not new. Get along then."

Pansy shot a warning glare over the dessert dishes at the other Slytherin and brandished her spoon.

Neville shifted in annoyance and – Merlin's beard, a peppercorn was wedged between his toes.

A more obnoxious voice than Malfoy's carried across the hall, "Better watch out there Malfoy. He knows how to take down snakes!"

Malfoy scanned around angrily, a lock of hair falling into his face. "Who said that?"

Neville ignored it and stared at the top of Pansy's head imploringly but she just shoved the spoon into her mouth again, refusing to even acknowledge his presence.

He nodded once, tightly, and retreated, dress shoes savoury and squishing as he walked.

* * *

><p>It wasn't polite to arrange a meeting and not show up, so true to form Neville tried to slip into the library like wind slipping through cracks after suppertime.<p>

"She's not there, mate." A couple of sixth year Hufflepuffs told him from the front desk where they were signing out a dusty tomb for history class. He didn't even know their names.

Neville nodded. As expected when scanning through the desks, she wasn't visible.

Despite being a smidge more popular these days, Neville never counted himself as part of the cool crowd. He'd probably committed some cardinal sin of social butterflies everywhere by choosing the Great Hall to ask Pansy Parkinson to meet him in the library.

Neville Longbottom's greatest Hogwarts achievement? Cementing his image as an awkward nerd in the eyes of every student in the school _at the same time._

Still, he clomped over to one of the larger tables set up next to the individual desks and hung his book bag onto one of the chairs, making it obvious he was saving the seat.

He waited patiently for what felt like ages, hands folded neatly atop the smooth wood, but it had really only been fifteen minutes. During that short amount of time he'd received a staggering amount of pitying glances from the after-dinner crowd, so he wretchedly pulled out a text to keep busy.

"Forgetfulness Potion? That's a _first year_ topic."

"Don't need to tell me I've to steer clear from them. That's why I have a Remembrall." Neville said keeping his eyes trained to the page for a moment before looking up at Pansy.

"Do you still use that?" Pansy asked and her eyes skittered back and forth as though hunted.

Neville stood and pulled out the chair for her. She eyed it with contempt and then jerked her head.

"Not this one. Come on."

Neville blinked but at her insistent glare he grabbed up the book bag hanging off the back of the saved chair and followed after her.

"You didn't think I wanted everyone in the whole bloody library to know my business, did you?" She asked stamping forward and throwing herself into the newly chosen chair before Neville could properly pull it out.

"What's so special about this table?" Neville asked, carefully setting down his things. He didn't mention that despite not being in the main table section, there was still a clear view of Pansy's pick.

Pansy rolled her eyes. "I put a Notice-Me-Not on it, obviously."

"Oh." Neville sat down with a thud.

Her small hand reached into the pockets of the Slytherin robe and she drew out the packet, sliding it onto the table. Neville felt some odd unidentifiable feeling spike in his chest looking at it.

Pansy pointed her wand and the packet unfolded itself like a tablecloth made of paper being spread out over top. "There's a joke going around about you these days. Something about you with the sword of Gryffindor, a massive snake, and a whore."

Neville fumbled his own wand. "_What?_" He took a deep breath. "Never heard it."

Pansy smirked, tilting her head. Her black locks seemed silkier than ever and a thought came to him.

"About the Stinksap," He watched her eyes narrow. "Ah, well, I'm curious how you got it all out? I have a _Mimbulus Mimbletonia_ myself, you know, and they're so tricky—"

"I managed." Pansy said tightly. He certainly thought so. Now that they were sitting together, it was like being coated in a cloud of perfume, except not the type that his Gran would douse herself in before an outing. It was more like a fragrance, a scent… Essence of something…

Pansy ignored him and got down to work. He noticed she'd made half of a frame out of the edge pieces and a great feeling of pride erupted somewhere inside of him. There was a pile of edge pieces in the middle of the unfinished frame and she put the pad of one pointer finger to the glass, sliding it around to try different places.

"Wow, Pansy, you've done great." He assured her and she staunchly continued to act prickly even though he could tell she was pleased.

He followed the example laid before him and started rearranging the tiny pieces that had been meticulously sorted. They worked in silence, although every so often Pansy would stretch her legs and kick him in the shin. Maybe an hour or so later, Pansy trampled on his foot in glee.

"Yes!" She cheered, smugness overtaking her. "I made a match. Longbottom, keep up."

He nodded quickly and redoubled his efforts, even though it felt disorienting to have a thousand little Hims staring back. He dragged a piece across a crease of the parchment and a flowery scent wafted up to meet his nose. What was that?

He tried to sniff discreetly. She'd shampooed _everything? _That fragrance… Neville was so curious. To someone whose greatest hobby involved the properties of plants, the fact that he couldn't immediately identify the ingredients was like brain rash.

The library slowly emptied as time went by, and Neville's brain rash worsened. With less distractions and the maddening puzzle in front of him, his senses whittled down to encompass a few things: one, the library lights flickered so much that it could gradually kill a man with madness; two, Pansy had no moral compass located in her feet, and three;

It was flowery and sweet and he _couldn't place the breeds_. It was driving him _insane._

He bumbled his way around the pieces, not seeing anything resembling a match. Maybe if he just… Neville chanced a glance upwards and watched Pansy biting at her lip, concentrating madly.

A bit of shame overcame him then, because this was her _life_ and she was taking this so seriously and letting _him_ help her. And all he could think about was her perfume.

What should he do?

He couldn't think about anything else. There was no way he could concentrate without at least getting another good sample. Neville cracked his fingers, making a cautionary stretch backwards.

Pansy ignored him.

He stood up and rotated his arms, realizing how stiff they'd become.

Still Pansy ignored him.

He went around the table and sat in the chair beside her under the pretence of collecting new pieces to sort. She rolled her eyes and horded a pile for herself.

When she bent over the mirror pieces once more to keep matching, he carefully, oh so slowly, put his arm around the back of her chair for leverage and— Sniffed her hair.

He darted backwards as if dodging an incoming curse, slumped to feign composure and remarked loudly, "I think I'm close to a match!"

Pansy's eyes widened but she said not a word about his investigative nose. Bingo. He'd have to make sure that memory didn't end up in the Remembrall.

Neville relaxed back into his seat, smiling casually and satisfied with his improved Auror-like stealth.

* * *

><p>Relative peace surrounded them until Luna Lovegood came over to the table, accessorized to the nines with a copy of the new Quibbler issue clutched to her chest and Spectrespecs covering half her face.<p>

He smiled nervously in greeting, hands full of glass. Luna leant down and took a long dragging sniff of his head.

"L-Luna," He stammered, stunned, "What are you doing?"

"Oh, I thought maybe that was the new fad to saying hello."

"On what planet?" Pansy intruded, voice filled with contempt. "How did you get through my spell?"

Luna sat down at their table and pushing up the specs, "I heard Neville's voice, and followed the Wrackspurts."

Oh boy.

"Um," Neville started off beautifully. "Pansy, I don't think you've ever been formally introduced. This is my friend Luna Lovegood."

"Nonsense," Luna gave a benign smile. "We've met before. When I was locked in the Malfoy's dungeon."

There was a dead silence that threatened to consume the table.

"Did you have a nice Christmas with Malfoy?" Luna tilted her head. It was extremely difficult to tell whether she was just being polite, nice, sarcastic, or a combination of all three.

Pansy looked like her tongue had been replaced with a slice of lemon. "No. I only stayed a few hours, you know that." She narrowed her eyes as if daring Luna to say something more.

"Errr…" Neville flapped the corner of the parchment so that Luna could see. "Look! We're working on putting this back together." He hoped she had sensed his pleading. He reckoned even the Giant Squid could sense it.

The blond girl let her gray eyes wander over the broken pieces. "Did you know the average time to complete jigsaw puzzles of a thousand pieces is about one day?"

Pansy perked up, leaning closer to the parchment. "Is that all? Swotty Ravenclaws are good for something…" Neville wanted to cast a Silencing spell on her for just a second.

Luna waved her wand over the pieces and then made a little ominous hum. "There's five thousand and two here."

Neville felt his jaw drop.

"It took me an _hour_ just to find that one match!" Pansy voice seethed into his ear.

"Well, let's puzzle it out, shall we?" Luna stuck her wand back behind one small ear, and Neville's Quick Quotes Quill jumped out of its bag, struggling to dance across a spare bit of parchment at his elbow.

"Say Pansy is able to find one match every hour on the hour. That would mean barring sleep, school and other distractions like mealtime and mishaps, she would put together twenty-four matches a day. Now, assuming that the matches are _separate_ pieces – because it's likely you'll find groupings – that means she would have to spend time looking through the leftover five thousand pieces before each match. Actually, when you think about it, that doesn't exactly fit into the one hour model, especially since after you've finished that frame there are no more references to follow. So, hmmm…. Let's revise…"

"You're making it more complicated." Neville said hesitantly and swallowed. That sort of reasoning was terrifying. Now that he thought about it, living with seven years of bad luck hadn't been _so_ bad…

Under the table something painful and sharp clamped onto his knee.

"Ow! Hey—Pansy?"

He and Luna looked at her, face ashen and dark hair slightly frazzled in the place Neville remembered putting his nose.

He reached out and smoothed it down for her, since it had been his fault. Pansy turned to him, head still in his hand and clawed at his knee even tighter.

"Longbottom. I want to stop!"

He reacted immediately and set the parchment into folding itself. The three students watched the dastardly thing flop back into its packet and then it spat out a rather familiar feather.

"There goes your quill." Luna mourned as best she could.

"It only wrote in Haiku anyway." Neville reassured. Pansy picked at the little tuft that was left and held it up to inspect. Then blew it in his face.

"Nice talking with you, Neville. It seems we're so busy these days." Luna raised one barely there eyebrow and the chair pushed back. "I'm going to work on my Herbology essay now though. You'd find it quite interesting if you weren't becoming an Auror."

A pang of longing filled him as he hastily blinked out feather. He was stuck writing a two-footer on various spells for silencing things. Boring. He resolved to start visiting the greenhouses now that he had more free time. The most Herbology Proudfoot talked about was taken right out of a textbook, and mostly involved How to Not Get Stuck in Another Person's Thatch.

"Bugger, I forgot about that one." Pansy muttered.

"Oh," That had suddenly pleased him and simultaneously made him envious. "You're still with Professor Sprout too then?"

Pansy rolled her eyes. "Yes. It's just as you remember it. Dashing sunlit days being doused in soil. Romantic moments of being caught by an over-amorous vine."

His palms started to prickle and Neville rather thought that did describe it.

"Essays are due next class and I haven't started." She moaned dramatically. "My bad luck's only just begun."

Luna tilted her head, Spectrespecs slipping back down onto her nose. "Can you feel when it comes and goes then? Like a breeze?"

Pansy stared at her long and hard and Neville didn't think Luna quite got the hint until he gave a little wave and the blond went on her way. Right then, that settled it. The Ravenclaw had definitely been a tiny bit sarcastic.

Neville smiled apprehensively, feeling a bead of sweat at his temple, eyes trained on the packet lying before them.

"I wasn't very lucky before I broke my mirror either. So, perhaps your life can't change _much_."

Pansy's lips were a tightly drawn line stretched across her face. "_You've_ changed though, Longbottom. You've—" She glanced up at his face, eyes hard before flicking back down. "Everyone knows that. Much as it pains me to admit it."

She got up, evergreen coloured skirt falling from her lap to just about her knees. They were slightly knobby when framed by the hem and her gray school socks. Her painted fingernails which had dug into him previously, curled around the packet.

Neville felt the inexplicable need to keep talking. "Hey, maybe you could even, um, give me the mirror. I'll work on it by myself for a few nights. You shouldn't let it distract you from your assignment."

Pansy glared.

Neville didn't like the way it felt like a Quidditch game entirely made up of quaffles was playing out in his stomach.

"And how do I know you won't mess with it?" Pansy's mouth twisted underneath her pug nose, but there was amusement dancing in her eyes. Neville frowned, unsure whether she was being facetious or just naturally suspicious.

"Do you really believe everyone has to have an ulterior motive?" Neville's voice became sort of high pitched at the word 'ulterior' and he swallowed thickly when Pansy trod on his foot. He looked down at her small foot on top of his.

"Not particularly." Pansy mocked, and he caught a whiff of that maddening fragrance. "But everyone wants something."

"Well, I don't." Neville frowned.

Pansy dropped the packet in front of his face but for some reason he kept talking. "Er. Hey, and… Bring me your Herbology parchment when you're done. We can revise it together."

It seemed like a pretty reasonable way to help her, in the face of things. He couldn't deny that he was curious as to what they were learning in the class. He truly missed it. Just listening to Pansy's decorous description made his pulse thrum in excitement.

It didn't hurt that Pansy's quick nod and swipe at his hair to mess it up made his heart race in excitement too.

* * *

><p>Neville propped himself up from a hunched over position. <em>Botany; Budding Believers<em> had some amazing descriptions of identifying different flora and fauna by scent that he'd never heard of before. It'd taken him a couple nights to get through it all, but he'd found exactly what he needed.

He read the simple biography written on the sleeve. Huh, written by a Muggleborn.

Neville had to shake himself out of it. The RATS required reading for the week was complete and he figured it was time to open up the packet that had been tickling the back of his mind.

He carefully unfolded the parchment on the side table he'd absconded for himself in Gryffindor tower. The mirror pieces that had already been fit together were hinged by temperary sticking charms. He moved those aside.

Looking down at the reflective pieces of glass took him back to those frantic nights he'd sat in his room doused in the light of a practice play wand under a sheet. He'd poured over those pieces for weeks and weeks, sporting scratched fingers and red rimmed eyes every morning until his Hogwarts letter had come. His grandmother planned to take him to Diagon Alley to shop for books and Neville had given up, desperately bundling up the pieces and burying them at the foot of the pond in the back of the house.

He'd gotten Trevor that day.

Neville smiled to himself, spreading out the pieces in no particular order.

"Someone smell flowers?" A younger Gryffindor asked aloud.

"I think it's bloody bizarre." Dean said, balancing Ginny's Pigmy Puff on the end of his wand, much to its peril.

"Oh?" Neville inquired without breaking puzzle solving momentum.

"I mean, it's bizarre I never thought of this before!" Dean expanded, and Ginny walked past the squashy Gryffindor couch, levitating the poor Puff to safety.

"Hey, I was playing with that— Nev, has she tried the WOMBAT way? To ward off bad luck. All you have to do is spin three times on the spot and then splinch your thumbs."

"She's not going to deliberately splinch her thumbs!"

"She might. Have you asked?"

Neville felt a headache coming on.

"Why are you helping her? She wasn't ever nice to you from what I remember. She's not any better now." Harry asked from his place next to Dean. Ginny had put the Puff on top his head and it courageously tried to make a nest out of his messy black hair.

"Not everyone is going to be exactly the way you want them to be." Neville said, finger pads dragging pieces around on the parchment, leaving fingerprints behind on the reflective glass. "Do you stop watering your plants if they don't blossom when you want?"

Harry managed to get the fluff ball out of his hair and came over to the table, inspecting the miniscule amount of progress done.

Neville had always figured he would be put in Hufflepuff. He loved Herbology and he didn't like sticking out. He'd never thought he was much of anything, let alone brave or courageous or even confident. All those years ago, when he'd first set foot in the castle, he'd thought he couldn't amount to anything great. Strangely enough, Harry was the one who told him he was worth more than ten Draco Malfoys.

Malfoy, who was a Slytherin; and Pansy, who was just the same.

They were the sort of people who were still working out who they wanted to be. They were all seeds that hadn't blossomed yet. The hat had put Neville in Gryffindor, seeing something brave in him, something courageous. From what Neville had seen during the war, it just took Slytherins a bit longer than the rest to grow into their greatness.

Harry didn't say anything in reply but Neville could tell he was participating, green eyes following the broken mirror shards like a seeker searching for the snitch. The black haired wizard reached out and touched a piece with his thumb, dragging it over until it met its mate on a crease of the parchment.

A faint floral scent wafted up. Harry sniffed.

"Red plum blossoms. With a hint of freesia." Neville supplied.

Harry just tilted his head. "Huh. Nice."

A loud bang made the two of them jump and Neville flew from his seat.

The Fat Lady began bawling in earnest at having been flung open and she blew her nose into an awkwardly tiny lace handkerchief so loud that Dean tumbled from the couch. Hermione and Ron clambered in both wearing frustrated faces.

Most of the common room dwellers just rolled their eyes, though some didn't let the couple pass without weighty glares for being disturbed. Someone flicked an Exploding Snap card at them and Ron was hastily putting out a fire on his sleeve as they crowded Neville's little table.

Neville watched Harry frown in question and Hermione raised her eyebrows. Ron shook his head.

"Everything all right?" Neville asked, unnerved by the trio's silent exchange in their alien language.

"All the books on magical mirrors have been checked out." Hermione told them, a wrinkle in between her eyes.

"By Malfoy." Ron finished with a more conviction.

Harry brow creased. "What could he want with them?"

"Well," Hermione said primly, smoothing back an errant curl behind her ear. "It's possible… for the same reason _we_ wanted them."

"That's exactly what I didn't want to hear." Harry confessed, he and Ron sharing a dark considering look.

"Are you lending a hand to help Pansy?" Neville asked, and he swallowed when all three pairs of their eyes fixated on him in tandem. They were scary in that way, how seamless they dug out answers like that.

He saw Hermione's brown eyes catch notice of the parchment.

Ron sniffed. "D'you smell flowers?"

"Plum blossoms." Harry said helpfully. "And freesia."

"Huh." Ron leant over and sniffed the general region of Neville's head.

"Nice shampoo."

"Er…"

The next morning Ron's hair was suspiciously silky, but not scented. By the end of the week, three people had stolen Neville's shampoo, soap and hand cream but to no avail.

* * *

><p>TBC...<br>Thanks for taking a look. I think I have some very very clever readers!


	7. Chapter 7

**SEVEN YEARS BAD LUCK**

* * *

><p><strong>Chapter 7 ~ Breeding Trouble as Easy as Breathing with Scars ~<strong>

* * *

><p>"Are you <em>actually<em> _dating_ Pansy Parkinson?"

Ginny Weasley's face was pinched.

She was in a terribly foul mood and had decided to walk with Neville to the Great Hall because Harry, Ron and Hermione had disappeared from the dorms early in the morning. And that must have been very early indeed because it was a Quidditch day. Neville could hear the Gryffindor team practicing through the tower windows just after dawn from all the way down at the pitch.

He'd been doing a great job not getting on her bad side. Dean hadn't escaped being bludgeoned by bludgers all morning and was now begging for something called _painkillers_, perhaps ready for the final blow care of Madam Pomfrey.

"No." Neville answered, genuinely shocked but amused at the funny face Ginny made. Her ease and candour about the subject before had never seemed to anger her until now.

"Oh. Oh well, that's fine then." She began to walk faster and Neville had to quicken his pace to catch up. Luckily for him it was easy, he was so much taller than the redhead and his stride was long.

"Ginny?" He peered down.

She stopped, causing him to almost bump into her. Ginny turned her head in one sharp motion, a confused but determined expression in her squinted brown eyes. "Is _she_ trying to date you?"

"No!" Neville wanted to laugh, but all he managed was a twitch at the corner of his lips. In terms of date worthy boys, he figured he fit pretty low on the list. He had to shake his head to rid himself of the ridiculous idea of _him_ going on _dates_…

Not only was it silly, but he'd always thought dating and marriage would find him after Hogwarts at some distant unknown time, when he was finally working on his Herbology career. Maybe he'd meet his future wife in Hogsmeade, even on a chance meeting while trying to relax after a hard day's teaching, and they'd reminisce about their time at Hogwarts. Things would go properly slow until marriage, and he'd come home to her every night with soil under his fingernails and a hot meal waiting on the table by a girl with a beautiful warm smile.

But now he was training to enter the Auror program, a three year long venture. After that he'd be a full-fledged Auror, and who knew how long he'd stay on service? Neville hoped he would eventually find his way back to Hogwarts, but what if he became a truly talented Auror like his parents?

What if he was destined to risk his life against the Dark Arts? What kind of person would he be, if he dragged a loved one into that? One of his biggest nightmares was to end up like his mum, handing back empty wrappers, empty emotions, to someone who loved him and had to take the very little he could give back.

What kind of man would he be, if he let someone give him their heart and he didn't do his damndest to hold on?

Ginny's brown eyes were dissecting him, like she could read every one of his thoughts. Why were girls so unnaturally good at that? Maybe he should start looking into Occlumency. He bit his lip and walked closer to the wall.

"I told you about the mirror. S'not so bad really, I actually like helping, especially since it was my fault she hit the thing."

"It's _not_ your fault." Ginny said with sudden vehemence. "You don't need to help her. Not even her own kind—" He suspected she meant Slytherins, "will lift a finger for her. Did you ever think _why? _I know you've got a thing for weird plants, but _Pansy?_ She's a weed!"

Ginny put a comforting hand on his arm, effectively causing him some annoyance. The plant analogy had been weak at best.

"You're better than that, Neville, and anyway, she'd look _better _with antlers—"

"And she's standing right here."

The Gryffindor pair turned their heads to see Pansy tapping her wand against her chin, dark eyebrow raised. For some reason she was only wearing one sock.

Neville closed his eyes for a moment of dread, silently hoping a row wouldn't start up. Both witches had some awful hexes up their sleeves and Neville would think twice before jumping in the middle.

Pansy's pug nose was scrunched up as she walked forward and Ginny was scowling at her, wand raised. Neville cringed, cracking open one eye to brace for damage. But then Pansy did a complete turn, hooking her arm around his. Ginny made an angry noise.

"Thanks for holding my books for me, _Neville_." Pansy crooned, voice dripping with syrupy sweetness.

Pansy had sneakily jabbed her wand into the small of his back and Neville yelped causing Ginny to jump and stare at them with suspicion.

Neville felt her wand dig deeper. "You're wel-come, Pansy." He croaked, wondering why it was always him in these messes.

She looked at him, expectant, and Neville's eyes darted to see Ginny growing even more irritated so he just shoved a hand into his book bag to hand the mirror packet over.

As soon as the flower scented thing slipped into Pansy's waiting hand, Ginny's face went red as her hair. "Remember what I said, Neville. We _all _think so."

Luna had arrived in the entranceway staircase that led down from Ravenclaw tower and Ginny flounced over to her, scarlet Quidditch robes billowing behind.

"_Ow,_" Neville frowned as he rubbed the sore spot. "Ow_. Why_ did you do that?"

"You've lost a lot of weight haven't you, since first year?" Pansy eyed him up and down, not bothering to answer his question.

"I'm about fourteen stone, maybe? Ow! Why are you _still_ jabbing?"

Pansy laughed at him. "She's jealous! I suppose the rumours about having the _sword of Gryffindor_ are true?"

Another sharp laugh and jab.

Neville frowned and took a deep breath. He much preferred staying far away from the arguments of girls, so he wasn't about to comment on anything that Ginny or Pansy had said. He wouldn't mention that Ginny only cared about directing his love life because her own at the moment was completely directionless. Likewise, he knew Pansy had overheard Ginny and was just playing up the redhead's temper by simpering on his arm. Even though they had come to some sort of strange truce, that didn't mean that she was capable of fancying him for real.

_Pansy_.

When ever had a Slytherin liked a Gryffindor?

Saying anything about another girl's business would only lead to trouble. He'd seen how things like that got boys (especially Ron) in the dog house. There was a reason his best friends had always been female. Neville knew when to shut up. But apparently that was something Pansy didn't.

He grabbed her wand right out her hand.

She shrieked. "Give me that!"

He turned it around in his grip, not taking his eyes off her vexed face; chestnut, ten inches. "Why were you doing that? Is there something wrong?"

"Old nasty habit," Pansy flipped her hair back. "I like poking my wand where it doesn't belong."

Neville felt his cheeks flush and he held her wand higher. "How about where you poke your nose?"

Pansy swiped for the wand, catching his wrist and Neville blinked, realizing for the first time that she was actually a rather tall girl. He let it go and she quickly stowed the wand away, blinking furiously.

She'd used Mrs. Bubbly's Hair Champagne to remove the Stinksap smell and the matching spray set to spritz everything else. It was a strong yet gentle scent that clung magically to everything it touched lest they use the Removal Wine and Rocks Scrub. People kept nicking his things, he'd only double checked to be informed.

"Hmph. Weasley. Everyone thinks she's so attractive, but judging from the looks of it…" Pansy's scrutinizing squinty look followed Ginny as she slammed away into the Great Hall, "I'd say the upkeep is more than she can afford."

"She lost her brother in the battle last year. I don't think she's been worrying too much about things like that."

Pansy didn't say anything, only looked him up and down with something like approval, holding the mirror packet loose by her hip.

And in that moment of blessed silence Neville felt the tiniest bit guilty for the _'nor should you,'_ that had been implied. It wasn't up to him to fix Pansy Parkinson. He'd only signed on for the mirror.

It was starting to look like he might have run into a whole new breed of trouble than before.

* * *

><p>And despite various protests, Neville carried on with life. He attended RATS class without any preamble and most new spells came to him quick enough that he felt confidence build. He visited the greenhouses when he could, and he watched Professor Sprout nearly cry when the Fanged Geraniums bloomed after tender care. He felt like Sir Luckless from <em>The Fountain of Fair Fortune<em>, having been doused clean of his bad luck.

By the end of November, and a few more library visits, he and Pansy had a frame and one little bundle of mirror shards that formed the shape of a daisy sitting in the middle of the parchment. Well, Pansy had said it looked like a Grim, but she lacked optimism and perhaps believed a little too deeply in Divination. Neville had eyed some of her Heptomology charts. To help distract her, he'd drawn an outline around the flower as proof, but she just assured him his artistic endeavours were grim too.

He couldn't blame her for the attitude. Pansy had been the victim of bad luck in nearly all her classes. The most recent escapade involved a tumbling mishap in Herbology causing a Mandrake seed to lodge in her ear. It made Neville grin now; although he'd been upset for near a fortnight, thinking of it as silent treatment only to find out she'd had a bad case of ringing ears.

The castle itself seemed out of sorts too, a noticeable sombre sort of mood had permeated the student body as homework piled up and classes became stifled with pre-holiday restlessness. Students practically salivated at the prospect of Hogsmeade weekends, and Neville himself was starting to feel the pull on his sanity. To top it all off, the enchantment of the Great Hall's ceiling had finally rewoven, though only in one patch. And right above Slytherin, it did nothing but rain.

Even on a beautiful crisp day outside, with the sun shining and cold breezes being broken across the lake, the rain staunchly poured overtop the silver and green table.

After breakfast, Pansy swiped at the back of her neck, finding more crumbled egg in the wide neckline of her school robes. She grimaced and let them fall on the floor in a sticky clump.

"Take the robes off and shake them out a bit?" Neville suggested, sitting next to her in the library.

Giving him impressive cut-eye, she did, and there had been maybe three chicken eggs worth hidden in the peak. Five if they were counting in quails.

Pansy let out a long suffering sigh; one Neville had become accustomed to and didn't enjoy hearing.

"I already _did_. Thought I got all of that."

"I know a good spell for degreasing." He offered.

Pansy scowled, as if he was an idiot for opening his mouth. She stood and wordlessly handed over the soiled garment.

"I can't believe they think _I'm_ the reason for the rain. Honestly, one curse and then you're a suspect for everything suspicious."

"You _are_ very suspicious." Neville said seriously, holding her robes aloft and inspecting the green collar with the pointing end of his wand. Suds sprang out and made a sound a lot like blowing bubbles into one's milk.

He'd come to realize that she genuinely seemed happier refusing his goodwill, though that didn't necessarily mean he should not offer it. It had been confusing at first, maddening really. She thought in a completely different frame of mind than he and then acted in a completely opposite way than the frame. It was like a picture bleeding out from its tiny frame into a massive puddle of colour; impossible for anyone except the artist to view the full picture.

Because who said _No_ in order to say _Yes?_

"Suspiciously _fashionable. _Are these custom?" Neville finished, flicking tiny bubbles around the intricate bits of silver brocade at the yoke.

Pansy cocked her head and smirked. It had become a kind of rapport between the two of them. At least to him it was a connection. He rather suspected that Pansy Parkinson preferred to call it a game.

They had 'game night' sometimes, working on the puzzle of the mirror in the library when free time was available. Sometimes when Neville saw the mirror, his heart would clench and he'd be mesmerized by the pride he felt for her progress, because there seemed to be a few more matches. Other times, when it looked exactly the same as before, she was merciless in her displeasure, taking it out on him by stamping on his feet and insulting everyone she knew he knew. He understood her reproach, because when left with some odd thousands of pieces left, it was hard to feel like celebrating.

Sometimes he wished on her behalf that it'd been a smaller mirror.

Pansy held out her arms. Neville kept himself from rolling his eyes and draped the crisply starched fabric over them. He half expected her to order him to button it up for her. He spared a vague glance at her chest where she left the ornate fastening undone, and then his eyes darted away. His own robes felt like a rather worn out quilt when compared.

"I'm to order some more robes in Hogsmeade later. Third set before holidays! Wish this ruddy curse would buy me the excuse to get more shoes." Pansy sat, finger lazily swirling a piece around in circles.

"Be careful what you wish for."

She yawned, "It's too _early._ Whose idea was it to meet now? They should have carriages to take us the entire way. I hate walking through snow."

He refrained from pointing out it had been her idea so that she could focus on the mirror before wasting the weekend away outside the castle. In actuality, they'd done little more than talk about Hogsmeade and other inanities all morning.

"Pansy, it hasn't even snowed much. There're loads of clear trails yet." Neville rubbed at one eye as if to tame its arbitrary wandering. "We're crazy though, doing this on a Saturday morning."

"I'm going to fashion snowshoes to make the journey back." Pansy replied not really paying attention to his admonitions. "Once, I built an igloo. Maybe I'll camp so as not to walk again tomorrow!"

Neville's first response was of disbelief. "Did you really build an igloo?"

Pansy made a funny face as though she'd been caught lying, but made sure to look at him in a way that left Neville wondering if he had something on his face. "Well Millicent helped. And we caught the flu, just like Trelawney predicted."

Neville thought he found a match but came up dry. Their daisy refused to grow.

"How is your fertilizer mixture doing? West African chilli pods hate the cold. Did you try the ground up fire seeds idea?"

The Slytherin dropped all pretences of puzzling and stared. "Really? Herbology at this hour? I'm near catatonic as it is."

"I'm sorry for hedging you on."

Pansy let out a snort and then actually laughed. "_Hedging._ Oh Merlin, Longbottom you slay good comedic tastes."

"I have taste!" He told her firmly, but she rolled her eyes.

"That vest begs to differ."

Neville couldn't help the smile that climbed up his lips. It was a bit charming really, when she grasped at straws to insult him like that. It meant she was running out of abusive things to say with only good things left stored up. He knew for a fact there wasn't anything wrong with his tastes, despite being a little dated, clothing included.

"This daisy is going nowhere." Neville blurted. "Perhaps we should just head up for a kip before Hogsmeade."

Pansy rose one eyebrow and a smirk slowly overcame her lips which, despite the early hour, she'd painted with a glossy light pink coat. He suddenly felt rather plain and unkempt with stubble and too-rubbed at eyes. There was a long pause as she appraised him, before:

"All right."

Neville set the parchment to repackage itself. "Maybe I'll see you in Hogsmeade then…" He trailed off, feeling foolish for even letting the words leave his mouth.

They hardly spoke around other people since the argument that nearly ensued between Pansy and Ginny. He diligently neglected to think of how Ginny hardly spoke to him now too. And how she had somehow roped Dean and Luna in on it. Coupled with the tight knit secretiveness of Harry, Ron and Hermione lately, he was actually rather alone these days.

He didn't think there was anything worth taking sides over. At least, he couldn't see any reason right now. Maybe when they finally repaired it, like Pansy's reflection, the answer would come.

Perhaps he'd stop in for new robes too.

Pansy's eyes were trained on the table, mouth pursed as she held the mirror in clenched hands. "I might sit in Madam Puddifoot's and work on it there."

Neville nodded and got the vague sense that he'd said something warranting the silent treatment from her as well, but he had no idea what. He couldn't stand it if somehow he lost this connection too.

"Before or after the igloo?"

Pansy laughed. And even though it sounded suspiciously like it was _at_ him, he didn't mind.

* * *

><p>"Do you need Madam Pomfrey?"<p>

There was an angry crash and bang.

Neville's agitated fingers carded through his hair and he sighed, leaning against the slick stones next to the slotted entrance to the second floor girls' lavatory. Daphne Greengrass gave him a sour look, arms crossed tight.

"I told you. She ran straight in here when I tried to take her to the infirmary. I don't fancy going in there myself."

He nodded and knotted the strap to his book bag around his knuckle in an anxious sort of gesture. Just the sounds of destruction alone were worse than what Peeves' got up to. No wonder Slughorn and the rest of her classmates had steered clear.

"When do you have potions?"

"Oh, first thing in the morning." Daphne replied, edging away as though she wanted to be rid of the burden. "It's been hours."

She didn't seem upset, although the Slytherin girl _had_ gone out of her way to get him at lunch time, leading the way to where Pansy had ensconced herself after a rather awful potions experiment. Though his rush to follow hadn't won him any favours from his house.

Where there had been laughing and jokes and even encouragement before, now lay only looks of confusion and even derision as he continued to meet the Slytherin girl. Bizarre and upsetting, he was half expecting Draco Malfoy to do a complete turnaround to have been secretly nice all along.

Just to be ironic.

"Pansy, are you hurt?" He called out in a tentative voice. There was a long pause, long enough that Neville was beginning to doubt he was the right man for the job.

"Good luck, Longbottom." The Greengrass girl told him and before he could plead his case on the matter she'd slipped down the corridor at record speed.

"I, um…" Neville wracked his brains. "I can send for Luna or er, Hermione!"

A hex flew out the door chasing him away down the hallway.

He came back breathing harder, frowning. All right then, a different approach: "How about Malfoy?"

He heard her chanting a familiar dangerous incantation.

"Oh no you don't!" He took a gulp of air and kicked the door in just in time to cancel out her spell with his eyes closed.

Neville lowered his wand, breathing harsh and eyes shut.

He was inside.

Inside a girl's lavatory.

Pansy let out an incomprehensible noise of frustration and there was a bang then the sound of rushing water. What was her obsession with the Blasting curse?

Neville knew he had to look so he let his eyes dart about, not keen on even moving his head lest an indecent female jump into the line of sight.

"_Homenum Revelo_," He muttered and released a tense sigh when it turned out they were alone.

He walked woodenly towards Pansy who had her back turned and she was sitting in a puddle. Her robes were sopping wet.

"Stop where you are!" She cried out, and then coughed. Something really awful must have happened. She smelt like smoke and was covered in black streaks of ash, as if she'd doused herself off. A newly ruined robe sat at her feet.

Cautiously he reached out and turned her around. She felt like a lump of coal in his hands, brittle and crumbly and burnt.

"I hate this curse, Longbottom! It's so… It's so humiliating. Look at what it's done!" Pansy cried, small nose running and cheeks streaked with fat tears.

Neville gulped, woefully unprepared.

Her once gloriously sleek hair was crimped and tangled, obviously having been on fire. Perhaps a cauldron fire gone awry or a flammable ingredient spilled on her head?

A burned up clump of hair fully exposed a scar on her neck, the one she'd gotten from the broken mirror. It seemed liked yesterday, but it'd been months, hadn't it? The line was still a pale pink slice against her fair skin. It looked as though Vector hadn't bothered to take her to the infirmary and a fresh wave of something like anger washed over Neville. Why hadn't Pansy gone by herself?

"Um…it's really inappropriate for me to be here." Neville could have flogged himself for being so fantastic with words. "We should get you to the Infirmary."

"Shut it, and help me up." In the puddle of cinders and water lay two broken off heels. He didn't know whether they'd broken first thus being the cause of her fall or if the puddle had been the slippery culprit, causing the heels to break. It seemed like the sort of thing he should have been able to discern, being an Auror in training and all. Bad luck was so unsystematic.

"Are you hurt?" He tried again.

Pansy glared. "When you're set on fire you tell me."

He subtly inspected her from top to bottom. He supposed that was _Pansy_ for 'no.'

"I have been on fire." He looked away as she pulled at her sweater, letting goopy drips of ash fall about her feet. The cistern, stalls and toilets… almost all the facilities were cracked or pulverized. The only thing that _wasn't_ was the large mirror hanging above the sinks.

"It wasn't that bad."

"Easy for you to say. Those were my favourite pair." She sniffed and brought shaking hands to her hair and patted it down in an obviously valiant attempt to not appear horrified. The burnt strands sounded like thistle and crackling birch.

"You're not beat yet." He told her. He remembered telling all sorts of students, young and old, the same thing whenever he'd stood up to the Carrows. He remembered telling Ron about the meaning of his scars when he'd led them into Hogwarts and why badges of hope were easy to bare.

But Pansy had never been there for that, and this had nothing to do with the war. She was looking at him like a flying carpet had flown from underneath her feet, turning her life upside down.

"I think Romilda Vane is supposed to be great at hair charms."

She laughed, once, sharp. "I wouldn't take hair advice from you even if it was covered in dittany."

Neville put a hand to the back of his head, aghast.

"Well, look at it this way. You can buy more shoes now." He tried to ignore her comment. "Or learn a slew of cobbler charms. I don't think glue will work on the soaked parts."

Pansy hobbled around him and viciously incinerated the ruined robes. "I can't believe I'm saying this… but I'm glad you came."

He bit his lower lip, shockingly glad at her words even if she seemed more interested in the effect of her vengeful wand against tattered cloth remains. "That scar?" He reached out carefully, thumb brushing the sore spot on her neck and she flinched, anger flaring behind her eyes. "It's just a nick that the curse managed to land on you. You're stronger than that."

She punched him in the chest as if to prove just that, and Neville pressed his lips together in a hidden smile, backing away and holding up his hands.

"I _know_ that, Longbottom." She spit like a dying flame. "Why do you think I didn't get it healed? If I got it fixed I wouldn't have half the motivation to be rid of the blasted curse. It's my damned _reminder_."

Neville became awash with something like gratitude, that finally there was someone who got it. Even if _it_ was a bit more savagely thought. He never expected two people to read something the same way, it only mattered that they were on the same page to begin with.

Pansy just glowered and rubbed her nose, blackening it, and trying not to resemble the burnt end of a matchstick. For some reason the thought that she'd look like a reindeer if she had antlers jumped to his mind and he smiled.

More than anything, she looked wont to blow things up again. "At least it can be removed, if I wanted. The ones Draco has are—" She sounded pained. "Bloody _Potter_. I want this curse off me. I can't bare it."

He'd been meaning to ask her for a while, for sake of mind. "Did you mean it? You know, when Voldemort asked…"

She flinched visibly and looked troubled, reading his question perfectly as if on the same line of thought.

"Seriously." Neville prodded and Pansy glowered at her sopping feet.

"Yes, I meant it."

He rather hoped that was _Pansy_ for 'no' too.

Neville nodded, thinking it over; about how Slytherin house had looked just as frightened as the rest of them, because Professor Snape had been driven from the hall and many members of their families had been fighting on the other side.

He doubted he would ever truly understand. The act of throwing someone innocent away just for the sake of yourself didn't make much sense to him. But he couldn't discount the fact that self preservation was higher on Pansy's list of priorities than his own. The way she tried so hard with the mirror, because she didn't _deserve it_, whereas he'd just gone and buried his... It wasn't fair to force people into taking risks they didn't want to. It was just the way things were.

They stood there in silence for a moment.

"Why'd you choose this lavatory? It's…" He eyed the grime that lined the uneven tiles; it looked a bit like a type of brown moss that grew opposite of the lake. "Rustic."

Pansy had a bit of an insane sharp grin that contrasted her red-rimmed eyes and puffy wet cheeks. "I came to stamp on Moaning Myrtle's head." She gave one great huff. "But she's not in."

"Suppose you'll have to settle for me." Neville said and Pansy sniffed her wet nose, shucking her broken shoes off.

"Come on." He said again and cautiously put an arm around her shoulders. She made a rough sound of protest but came willingly enough. Neville remembered the way she'd clung to Malfoy's arm outside the Room of Requirement and concluded she was the type that liked something to hang onto even if she did it with the intention of letting go.

Neville guided them out the destroyed bathroom and thanked Merlin that her fit hadn't been somewhere more frequented. He stopped. Pansy's steps were so jilted and heavy it felt like he was leading her on a death march.

He took a deep breath. "Don't worry Pansy, if someone comes by, I'll _Confudus_ them so they don't remember your hair."

That seemed like the right thing to say because she slumped against him and he felt her fingernails dig into his side.

* * *

><p>He'd intended to walk her to the infirmary, but she'd threatened to scream down the entire third floor so he ended up taking her back to that blank wall in the dungeons.<p>

_Confudus_ count? Six.

There was a shuffling of heavy footsteps coming round the bend and Neville trained his wand again, ready to make it lucky seven.

Except it was Professor Slughorn sneaking around the corridor with and an absolutely tickled expression. He was in possession of a large box of crystallized pineapple and a dozen little vials holding potions ingredients hanging from his inner coat.

They stared at him and the old man stared back, face trying to rearrange itself into a more appropriate expression. It was obvious he hadn't expected errant students out of class to witness the joyful little jaunt.

"Er, lovely day, isn't it? Perfect for a little romantic truancy!" Slughorn said loudly and then in a whisper, "I won't tell if you don't!" He held a finger to his lips and began shimmying past them, vials jingling like Bouncing Christmas Bluebells. Neville watched him with an open mouth.

Those had looked like Venomous Tentacula leaves.

"He's not coming in." Pansy said waspishly at the backwards-stepping professor, "I'm not his sodding girlfriend!"

Neville shook his head quickly, "Wouldn't dream of it."

Pansy stamped on his foot.

Strange enough, he'd never thought he'd be whistling some nameless cheery tune through the cobwebs of the dungeon in all his years at Hogwarts.

Of course, by the time he got back to Proudfoot's classroom, he'd landed himself seven pages worth of lines and the tune became one lone toneless sharp note.

* * *

><p>"Bebember bixth bear, when Babsy bus <em>vilifying<em> you about hurting Balfoy in Boaning Byrtle's toilet?" Neville asked out the corner of his mouth. He had three quills, pre-inked, one in both hand and one between his teeth in an attempt to write an essay faster.

"Bat bus an embellishbent, bight?"

Harry looked at him like he'd grown a basilisk head from his seat at the fire. Neville twitched, a bit of a nervous habit whenever someone stared at him like that. He spat out the quill.

"The thing is," Neville braved on, "The thing is, well, she's still crying about it. About _scars_, and— I just wanted to know— if it was true?"

His voice pitched up at the last word, because Harry's expression had shifted from bewilderment to being downright upset. He was looking at Neville with those brilliant green eyes but it was as though he was seeing something else entirely. It made the hair on the nape of Neville's neck stand on end in an unpleasant sensation. Harry'd always been a bit spooky.

In the crook of the couch, Hermione was cocooned in her blanket with Ron who had dozed off in their comfortable position. She had been silently reading one of her many texts but Neville saw the worry etched on her forehead.

She put the book away and reached out to take Harry's hand, mouth a pursed line. "Harry."

Neville was about to apologize for asking but Hermione squeezed Harry's hand like it was a lifeline and then pinched him, hard. "Harry!"

Harry blinked and then scowled, turning his face away.

"It's okay—" Hermione started, but then she stopped herself and took a deep breath before shaking her head from side to side in a slow motion. She swallowed and Neville paid close attention to the way the firelight cast creative shadows across the tight knot of their hands. A different kind of knot tied itself in his stomach.

"I've left scars too." Hermione confessed in a low watery voice and Harry ripped his hand away.

Neville frowned at their angst. It wasn't right to wallow as it never led accomplishment. He'd wallowed more than enough for his fair share. But his annoyance at maudlin thoughts over past events didn't stop him from wanting to apologize as he watched his friend trample up the stairs towards the dormitory.

Hermione gave a helpless sort of shrug and shook her head.

* * *

><p>When he next saw Pansy, her hair was cut into an attractive bob.<p>

"What have you done with your hair?" Malfoy drawled so loudly that Neville could hear it from across the hall. And that in itself was an impeccable feat, considering there was now a downpour atop the Gryffindor table.

"It's ghastly. Pansy, I absolutely won't marry you now."

Pansy laughed and looked happier than she had in weeks.

* * *

><p>TBC...<p> 


	8. Chapter 8

**SEVEN YEARS BAD LUCK**

* * *

><p><strong>Chapter 8 ~You've Charmed the Parts I Can't See~<strong>

* * *

><p>After the Potions accident, Pansy redoubled her efforts.<p>

And by doing _that_, Neville more accurately thought, she'd doubled the amount of time they spent together.

Pansy was smirking, though there was a tinge of humorous annoyance to her tone. "I can't _believe _him sometimes."

"Oh yeah?" Neville replied, absentminded. "What did Malfoy say?"

"You should _hear_ him." She took a deep breath and lowered her voice, swaggering towards the library exit after a good few hours of puzzling over the mirror. Neville held the door open for her and let it clatter behind them as her words stretched out into a telltale drawl.

"Pans', you look like Celestina Warbeck in her performance of _You Charmed the Heart Right Out of Me, _which you _know _was the lowest point of her career. _Honestly_," She wagged her arms, causing Neville to hide a smile behind his hand, "Everyone knows _Beat Back Those Bludgers, Boys_ had her best style."

Neville walked warily beside the Slytherin girl, passing other straggling students trying to get back to their common rooms before curfew. It wasn't that he was bored of spending time with Pansy, nor did he mind her locating him after classes (and sometimes between) to chat about the most random of things or drag him off to an arbitrary corner to help with the puzzle. (Oh yes, she'd even set it up outside on a picnic blanket once, and the nicety of the event was only punctuated by having to chase mirror shards down the yard through the frost-covered grass.)

He understood it all in some grander sense; when he wasn't too busy practicing spells or working on assignments or staring at a thousand little hims when shifting through mirror bits. She was lonely too, because Slytherin wasn't exactly crawling with friendly faces, and hey, Neville really enjoyed learning new things and having to check on plant progress for her Herbology assignments in Greenhouse three.

They were something like friends. Except for the bits where she insulted him and stepped on his feet.

No, it wasn't that Neville was bored with Pansy. It was mostly that he was secretly jealous.

He hadn't realized it until a previously overlooked observation sinisterly transfigured itself into an ugly spinning bramble of thorny indignation inside his chest.

Pansy Parkinson spoke about Draco Malfoy _way too much._

He felt a slight brush against him and looked down. Pansy was flicking away something and then picked again at a tiny sky blue button on his shirt, just above where his bellybutton was.

"Stray thread. You're getting shabby." Neville quickly rubbed at the missed stubble on his jaw that he thought wasn't noticeable. Scrupulous witch. She missed _nothing._

"Gladrags is doing you no favours."

"Actually, my Gran gets all my shirts at Twilfit and Tattings in London." He frowned down at the wayward button.

"Oh." Her eyes went wide and lips curled.

"She loves the antique hats at Gladrags though, said that they have the best selection up here. I don't know about that. They've all got awful taxidermy vultures on top."

"I always thought those quite fetching."

"They're archaic! And I swear sometimes their eyes still move!"

"That's what's so fetching!"

She poked him again but there was no thread from what he could see. Maybe he'd zoned out, just a little, because the pointed toe of her shoe prodded at his ankle.

"About the mirror, Longbottom."

"Hmm?"

"If you ever spot my reflection, make damned sure it doesn't run to another piece."

"All righ—Wait. _What?_ It can _do_ that?" Neville gaped, feeling like a flying carpet had just flown from beneath his feet.

Pansy bit her lip nervously. "I don't know. Draco just told me that it may…" She trailed off and Neville felt the brambly tumbleweed inside his chest spin violently.

He wasn't sure if he wanted the answer, but he asked, "Is Malfoy you helping as well?"

"No." She scowled as if thinking about an instance when the blond Slytherin's nose could have used hexing. For all he knew that could mean she fancied the git. They went down the stairs and passed the tapestry of battling headmasters towards the dungeons. It was only proper to walk her home.

"Unless you count searching through the Restricted section with me the first time, and we didn't find anything then."

Neville paused, remembering what Ron and Hermione had said about Malfoy and books.

"Are you _sure_ he didn't find anything?"

Pansy frowned, expression quizzical. "And why would he? He'd've said something."

Neville hastily apologized, not wanting to have a fight. About _him_. If anything could break up his and Pansy's delicately balanced camaraderie, it was Draco Malfoy.

Still, he could sense that he'd thrown her into a foul suspicious mood which followed for days afterwards. In that time, Neville made a valiant effort to stay out of her way.

At the end of the week, he heard Dennis Creevey had had his teeth hexed into toffee and a score of rats let loose upon him in Care of Magical Creatures. It was an oddly sweet sort of retribution.

* * *

><p>Christmas holidays were right around the corner, only a fortnight away, so Neville spent that weekend scouring Hogsmeade for presents.<p>

For company, Hermione actually decided to break away from studies and secret plotting enough to tag along. Together they managed to get the most important people out of the way. Neville stowed the various packages and paper gift bags underneath his bed and awoke bright and early on Monday morning to find it snowing up a storm outside the windows.

"I've been waiting ages for this weather." Dean told him, whilst they blinked madly against the reflected sunlight. Down by the lake they could see the snow had piled up into thick hilly dunes.

Neville was grateful for Dean's easy going nature. Not just anyone could put up with staying neutral in a long-lasting cold war with Ginny Weasley. He still didn't know what he'd done wrong, but Dean assured him it was silly. However Ginny had commandeered Luna, and bless her oddities, Luna didn't even seem to notice she'd been stolen.

It didn't faze Neville much anyway. He had an essay a mile long that still needed grammatical revision and another foot on the Importance of Stealth and its Friend, Transfiguration. They transfigured the darndest things, really. Who knew what an Auror in field would need with a goose who laid golden eggs?

* * *

><p>"Not many people outside before class today." Dean murmured from behind a thick scarf apparently sent as an early gift from Seamus' mum. He vaguely wondered if Dean missed his best friend, and when Neville watched him go off trudging into the snow towards his Magical Creatures class alone, he thought he might.<p>

"Oomph!" Neville groaned and held his side, mittened hand coming away with the remands of a snowball.

His eyes traced it back to its tosser.

"Morning, Pansy!" Neville waved. She was standing just behind the door leading inside from the courtyard with a sneer that suggested her opinion on the sudden blanket of snow.

He jogged towards her. "I think that one had ice in the middle."

"That jumper is as pretentious as it is hideous." Pansy greeted.

"I—" Neville blinked as if he'd heard wrong and spared a glance downwards at himself as he stepped inside the landing. "There's nothing wrong with it."

"Yes there is." Pansy said with conviction. "Take it off."

"_What?_"

Pansy cocked her head.

"But, it's cold." Neville tried, confused, but Pansy had a persistent edge about her. Inadvertently his gaze wandered lower, to where her boot tapped harshly into the tracked-in slush. As he made his way back up, he noticed she was wearing short sleeves under winter robes. Perhaps the house elves had lost all her jumpers, or a rogue cat had torn them all up. With bad luck, it could have been anything.

He unfastened his own robes dutifully.

"The sight of that purple argyle is sickening." Pansy continued.

"That's—" He pulled the offensive garment over his head, mussing up his hair. He held it out in front of her. "That's _not_ purple."

An eyebrow rose and Neville dropped it into her waiting hand.

Pansy wasted no time and pulled the argyle nightmare on, amusement dancing in her eyes, short bob of black hair flipped over in a staticky mess.

The handiwork of Wrackspurts. Definitely Wrackspurts.

The hem reached the middle of her stocking thighs which forced Pansy to roll down the waistband on her skirt. That explained why it had always seemed so short. He'd merely thought she had freakishly long legs.

A group of Hufflepuffs surged past and opened the large wooden door beside them. He felt his cheeks grow hot under the sudden assault of cool air. The pattern _did_ seemed a bit purplish actually, now that he was seeing it on a feminine figure.

"It's _not_ purple_…_is it?"

"Thanks, Longbottom." She smirked, giving her skirt one last tug.

"Neville." He corrected but she'd already shrugged on her robes overtop and raced across the courtyard, a shortcut most people took to get to the west stairwells that could be followed down into the Potions dungeon.

"Oi, Neville!" Ron called out from just down the hall. The tall brunette jogged over so they could head to RATS class together.

"Hey, where'd your purple jumper go?" Ron asked. "You're going to be right chilly."

Neville followed him, tugging at the collar of his shirt and rethinking his wardrobe in quiet horror.

* * *

><p>When they'd reached the classroom, they found Harry sitting at the desks in a glaring match with Draco Malfoy.<p>

"What are you doing here?" Ron asked with a darkly suspicious look.

"Becoming an Auror, Weasley." Malfoy replied, reclining in his desk with a flourish.

"Becoming a nuisance, more like it." Harry muttered.

Ron's jaw fell open. "No!"

"Yes," Malfoy said, eyebrow twitching.

"Harry, tell him he can't!"

"I already did, Ron."

Ron looked to Neville but the brunette Gryffindor evaded him, dropping his book bag and taking a seat. He was going to be accepting and nonjudgmental. He was going to be a gentleman. For Pansy's sake. Or he'd never hear the end of it.

"It's a little late to start these classes, isn't it?" Neville inquired lightly to the white-blond back of Malfoy's head.

"I'll manage." Was all he said, staring resolutely at the blackboard as if expecting lesson notes to emerge.

Neville smiled benignly and shrugged at the gobsmacked Gryffindor pair. They were like kettles ready to blow their lids at any moment. Lucky for him, only a tumbling spinning coil of barbed wire and resentment wound him up invisibly inside.

"Slytherins." Neville surmised. "Better late than never."

"Weasley, take your seat." Proudfoot announced. The Auror followed his overly large nose into the room and dropped his hat on the coat rack without budging a finger on his fresh coffee mug. The wooden structure had obviously decided to imitate the Whomping Willow because it waited until the man passed to set his briefcase and brolly down before it whacked the offensive tweed clear across the room.

Proudfoot didn't notice and waved his wand causing a new lesson plan to appear in thick chalky letters on the board.

Ron's jaw snapped up and he slumped into a chair.

"Right, we've got a new member." Proudfoot enunciated and gestured to Malfoy. "Do try to keep up. You've missed the entire half."

The Slytherin straightened up. "Actually, I _was_ here last year, for the majority— and I'm rather set with Potions so I didn't—"

"Yes," Proudfoot's upper lip tried to scoff but it was strongly blocked by his large round nose which resembled Rudolph's because of the weather. "And all set with fighting the Dark Arts are you, Mr. Malfoy? Think you can skip ahead?"

"Well—" The back of Malfoy's neck turned pink and Neville heard Ron snicker. Harry was staring at Malfoy with a disturbing amount of intensity.

"Wands out. We're beginning with some advanced Defence today. If your shielding spells aren't up to par with your schoolboy hexes I hope you're all _set_ to do drills."

Neville heard Ron's forehead thunk against the desk.

The boys scraped back their chairs. It was going to be one long day.

* * *

><p>"Think about it this way, you've got a valid excuse to spend more time in that mirror. It can tell you all the number of methods to hide your hair in ways I can't."<p>

"I can't _see_ myself in that mirror." Pansy hissed, vex beyond words. Neville edged away.

Pansy had shown up after classes, probably with a woeful tale about the sickness Malfoy must have incurred for him to skip all lessons, only to find him loitering inside the same room as Neville.

Her shock only paved way for a glorious tirade that consisted of listing every single instance Draco Malfoy had lied to her (and it was a list longer than Merlin's holy beard, Neville was sure).

Malfoy just bore it all with a smarmy expression and Neville ground his teeth silently, already used to having Malfoy along for the walk back to Slytherin care of Pansy's spiel on daily events. If that was bad, having the real thing along was torture.

He didn't even have a decent excuse to be angry. Only that he had rapidly become a third wheel.

Still, it was only proper to walk her back.

"We'll go to the hairdressers across from Honeydukes next weekend. Dreadful establishment, but perhaps Trevor can re-grow this…" Malfoy's long white fingers splayed through the near pitch black of Pansy's locks and Neville felt ire not unlike Pansy's growing within him at a steady gait.

"_Trevor? _I am not having my hair grown by a man named Trevor!"

"I think you look pretty. Like an edgy London-type model." Neville piped up, petulantly picking at one of his shirt buttons and thinking of the advertisements in the windows of Twilfit and Tattings.

Not even bothering to care to sound less surly, he continued. "And what's wrong with the name _Trevor?_"

He could practically hear Pansy's mouth quirk to the side in a smirk when she spoke.

"Well, that's a _toad's_ name, isn't it? Oh! Here's one for you," They sprinted across the Great Hall's foyer, arms and legs stiff like planks in hopes of warding off the cold. Filch still hadn't fixed the draft.

She sidled away from Malfoy and sent a sharp elbow into Neville's side. "What did the toad do when he crossed the road?"

"I don't know. What did he do?"

"_Croak_."

Neville grinned and covered his mouth, deep chuckles rising up like a spray of colourful balloons into the sky. Suddenly, the winding bramble of ire that had been rolling around inside his chest vanished. Pansy began to cackle in earnest and their laughter echoed off the ceiling when they entered the stairwell towards the dungeons.

Malfoy gave them one genuinely appalled look from behind.

"Are you serious? Pansy, that was _poor. _Even for you."

And just like that the good mood shrivelled away again when Pansy made an enraged sound and launched a blind kick to Malfoy's kneecap, but missed completely and kicked the stone steps instead.

She shrieked, "_Draco,_ you bloody prick!"

Malfoy growled, gray eyes flashing with anger. "What the hell was that? Were you really going to _kick_ me? I was _joking_."

"Um…" Neville stood back, shocked.

"I didn't find it very funny!" She hissed, embarrassed, and _Episky'd_ her crumpled accordion toes.

"Merlin." Malfoy looked like he was holding in a laugh. "You're cursed! If you go around swinging at things like a Muggle peasant you're going to get yourself hurt. Next time use a hex!"

Pansy looked the boy up and down with narrowed hazel eyes and then she opened her mouth again, probably to object and start a row of epic proportions, so Neville had to say:

"Shut it!"

They turned to stare at him with wide eyes. Pansy's lip curled up as if she were about to sneer some awful insult so Neville strode forward.

"Shut it." He muttered in a low voice, nearly nose to nose with her.

Pansy blinked up at him, mouth agape.

"Hey, Longbo—" Malfoy started to hiss and Neville rounded on him next.

"Just. Stop! Malfoy, you've been insensitive and getting on everyone's nerves all day! So either apologize or just—just, go!"

Malfoy looked as though he'd been smacked by the giant squid. Gray eyes went to the side, surveying Pansy, and then his mouth became a thin line.

"Suit yourself." He said in a halted manner and pushed his way around the two, disappearing at the bend at the bottom of the stairs.

When Neville finally shook himself out of it and turned back to Pansy, she was staring at him like he'd grown an extra head.

"Wow." She finally declared.

Her eyelids lowered until those hazel eyes were near slits, her lips curling into a great big smirk. Neville swallowed, his collar feeling tight and constricting. Nothing she could say with that expression would be good. And he didn't expect what came next:

"That was bloody _hot._" She made and exaggerated motion of fanning herself. "Remind me to get on your bad side one of these days."

Neville stared gormlessly. The ball of brambles tumbled away and in its place was a sudden profoundly large pit of embarrassment. "Uh…"

"Come along, Longbottom." Pansy took his arm with a lofty tone, chin angled up.

Neville gulped and nodded. Then she pulled them until they were practically running through the corridors to take her home, running away from the jokes, from Draco Malfoy, from everything.

* * *

><p>After that, Malfoy sat next to him in class. Every class. Every day. Malfoy told awful jokes and expected him to laugh. Malfoy nicked old scrolls and notes from his book bag. Malfoy told him to call him <em>'Draco.'<em>

Somehow he'd earned _Draco's_ respect and friendship.

Neville's head thunked against his desk and Draco asked him if taking notes in Morse code was standard Auror practice.

"All right, Longbottom." Draco slid a sheet of crisp parchment between Neville's nose and the desk early one morning. Proudfoot sat at his desk sipping his coffee thermos like it was a lifeline, ignoring the world while they supposedly filled out worksheets.

"Here's how it will work. I need you to teach me the Patronus charm, no Auror is complete until he's got one n' all."

Neville rolled his head so the paper stuck to his flushed cheek.

"Mal—"

Draco raised one imperious eyebrow. Oh how he hated how similar Slytherins were! It was beginning to provide reasonability to their insanity.

"_Draco._" Neville corrected himself. "Why are you asking me? Mine doesn't even have a corporal form. You _know_ Harry would be the better—"

The frost in Draco's glare left no room for argument.

Obviously Harry had overheard them and he spared them a baleful look from the corner of his eyes before he turned in his seat to loudly discuss acceptable wand waving techniques with Ron. They acted hoighty-toighty about their Defence expertise which in turn made Malfoy try to do the same. It was one big mucky ball of moody teens pretending to be charming.

Neville's head met the desk again. Draco Malfoy was being _pleasant._ The irony.

* * *

><p>"There is <em>no<em> way. Impossible."

"Come on, Pansy." Neville tried to coax her once more up the hill.

It was a large hill, now that they stood next to it, coated in a thick tier of snow and sparkling in the sun. They'd ventured outside on the beautiful day— much too beautiful to pass up indoors— after running by the snowball war occurring in the courtyard.

Last he'd seen of the battle, Dean and McLaggen had dove head first into a dune for cover as a magical barrage of snowmen charged. Even Malfoy was having the time of his life against a bundle of warring Ravenclaws and Hufflepuffs as he cast snowy tidal waves upon them from his high perch on the statue of Merlin.

Besides, Pansy insisted they build an igloo. On the top of this hill.

"I absolutely can't walk up this beast." She said, kicking at the base of the elevated hump of ground.

"_You're_ the one who wanted to go up there."

Pansy seemed ready to reconsider. "But _you're _so strong and brave!"

Neville snorted and rubbed his dripping red nose with a woolly mitten. He'd be lucky if he didn't catch a cold. Pansy had gone and stole his navy blue wool hat. A breeze blew into his face, and hair that had grown to begin tickling the bridge of his nose was sent flying back.

Pansy squinted and peered into his face. "You've got some scars, up there."

She un-tucked one bare hand from beneath her armpits and waved it in the general area of his forehead.

"Oh, yeah. From last year." He moved to smooth down the brown locks.

"Looks better with your hair pushed back." She said, and he dropped his hand, eyes widening and darting to look the other way.

"Um," Neville kicked at a clod of snow. "Well, er…"

Pansy bounced from foot to foot, inspecting the dastardly hill.

"Oh!" He yelped. "Of course! The Importance of Stealth and its Friend, Transfiguration!"

"_What?_"

"Here," He brandished his wand. "I can't believe it didn't come to me before. There's a spell for this. We can transfigure any shoes we want."

Pansy got a crazed look. "Teach me!"

"Hold on," A little swish and another and then large swooping flick…

They teetered on the spot and suddenly found their feet clad with snow shoes.

"Brilliant!" Pansy grinned and Neville felt his heart race when she grabbed his hand and shoved him up a few steps. "All right now start climbing!"

"Hey, don't push!" He replied but didn't really mind with her holding his hand like that. Perhaps she meant to nick his mitts too. They ambled up the hill, step by step, and had made it about quarter-way until, inevitably—

"These are—" Pansy huffed and puffed, complaining in a loud voice and clouds of breath steaming her rosy pink face, "A _nightmare._ It's like I've got baskets on my feet!"

"Wait. There must be a sort of better technique." Neville frowned in concentration and took one big step forward, hoping to prove Pansy wrong, but the snow underfoot was thicker than anticipated and he found himself knee deep in a bank, sticking out of the ground like a tree that had grown at an odd angle.

"Oh, very skilled technique you've got there." Pansy cackled at him and batted at his flailing arms for his hand which she took tightly to tug.

"Wait, Pansy, I'm not balanced, we'll—!"

"Woah-woahhhhhhh!" They screamed and toppled over with a large _fwump_ to slide down into a layer of snow at the bottom of the hill.

They lay there on the ground, out of breath. Neville could feel blood rushing around in his fingertips and maybe he shouldn't have eaten that extra bit of pudding because his stomach was doing flip flops. It was obvious now. Wizards were not meant to be on baskets.

He turned his head, the rest of his body too entrenched in snow to even risk a twitch. He stared into Pansy's ear, just visible under the stolen hat.

"Longbottom, this is your fault."

Neville laughed at the gall. Pansy glanced out from underneath her blunt black bangs, with amused eyes, wet lashes catching in the straight hair.

He kept picking at a loose thread on his jumper cuff. It had appeared after Pansy returned it (more like she had flung it back at his head) and now he couldn't stop pulling at it. It unravelled and he made a fist to stop.

She was watching her own shallow breaths with slightly crossed eyes. Perfect little puffs for blowing intricate lacy frills of cold air. He observed the plumes of condensation waft away from her lips and felt a warmth spread from somewhere inside, like butterbeer pouring into an empty stomach except in reverse.

"You know," Neville breathed out, and it sounded like his words were stretched and oblong, squeezing around bubbles of air. "I'm glad we're friends now."

Suddenly he felt Pansy's fingers tighten on his, bringing their cold linked hands back to life.

"_Friends_, are we?"

"Well, yes." Neville rolled onto his side and groaned at the sensation of a fat bruise blossoming.

Pansy's eyelashes were thick and gummed with makeup, looking like matchsticks with spots of ash dancing upon them. She squinted, slivers of hazel eyes like ambers in the bright winter light.

"You've had lots of girlfriends, haven't you?"

"What?" Neville's confusion cracked and a chuckle escaped him. "I think your puns have gone astray."

Pansy rolled to view him then, her short black hair falling across her jaw like a dark fringe on a velvet curtain, lips a dusty shade of lavender. She looked bemused and blew out a long stream of air that tickled his nose and reminded him of the way smoke would pour from the end of Uncle Algie's pipe.

"Can't be helped. You're your own best joke, Longbottom."

Neville frowned at the barb but knew enough that Pansy was happy to pay him in insults if she thought she was being misunderstood. She turned away from him and resumed watching her breath create swirling curls in the air.

Neville frowned at her ear. "I'm sorry?" He tried.

She shimmed and created an angel, a sweet gothic imprint of herself in the snow. Pansy started to laugh, a bit maniacally. "How am I to get out of this mess?"

"Do you—" Neville gave a great pause, thinking that it could be the very worst time to ask but at the same time, he knew that there were some things you couldn't share without ending up liking each other. And he wanted Pansy to like him. It would make everything so much simpler.

Pansy scrunched her nose and squinted at him as if asking for elaboration on his blundering half-sentences. The unexpected adorableness of the gesture mostly made him feel like he was woefully inadequate.

"Do you think you can finally start calling me by my name? Neville." He asked, firm.

In her silence he could practically hear an entire parchment-long spiel of mockery but instead of listing his shortcomings, she said:

"I don't know." Her expression revealing nothing, "I think I like Longbottom."

Pansy's hand in his was icy, like she was truly coldblooded and needed to lie directly in the sun in order to act any warmer. Neville pressed his lips together, that fizzing feeling in his stomach erupting.

"Um," What a time for linguistic ability! "What's wrong with Neville?"

"I have a secret for you, Longbottom." Pansy announced, changing the subject, and Neville's face felt warm in contradiction to her frosty lips when she shimmied closer and put her mouth to his ear. He strained to hear, but it felt like Pansy was just mouthing words, the tiniest of brushes touched the shell of his ear. His stomach flopped around like a fish out of water.

"Did you hear that? She asked, leaning back.

Neville shook his head giving her an imploring look. "Can you repeat it?"

"No." Her frosted voice split down the middle like a tiny crackling from inside an ice cube. "Shh. I'm pretending this is our igloo."

She shushed him again (even though he had become breathless) and put a finger to his lips. Her eyelashes were black clumps and cheeks flushed and it was freezing but his purple argyle jumper felt unnaturally like a greenhouse.

His perception narrowed down to a frame of just her head, and then just her face, and then just her eyes and nose and lips, and then just her—

Pansy touched her nose to his and rubbed, once, twice.

Neville found himself blinking cross-eyed. Pansy pulled back, a grin full of girlish secrets splitting her mouth wide open.

"You should _see_ your _face._" Pansy crowed then grabbed his arm, pulled the frazzled sleeve up, and twisted the skin between two fists.

"Aurrrrgh!" He cried in pain.

The Slytherin got up, kicking off her transfigured boots. One hit his shin and he cringed, leaning on elbows to see her trudging up the hill towards the top in just her thick wool stockings.

"What do you call that one?" He yelled after her. She used her wand to send a tidal wave of snow over top of him like a dollop of mashed potatoes.

"Muggle_burn!_"

"I'm a pureblood!" He shouted back, mouth full of snow. Somehow it seemed idiotically important. "And you were pretending you couldn't climb, before!"

"I know!"

* * *

><p>It was like a Giant had walked all over his insides, squishing them into pulp. The feeling eluded words, and he vaguely noted that no such song had been coined to phrase his predicament, though Celestina Warbeck came close.<p>

He was half empty and half disgustingly mushy at the same time. It was a woefully wretched existence. Because Neville was so used to being the _good friend_ to all of the girls he knew, it never once crossed his mind that maybe he could… start to like one… _that_ way.

Was he a late bloomer? Was he like a rare plant, plain and ordinary until exploding into flower years after everyone else? Was he exploding inside, where no one could see?

Neville pressed the balls of his hands into his eyes and grimaced at the intense blackness he'd created under the canopy of the four poster bed. Tonight in the Gryffindor dormitories, a black cavern of nothingness was the perfect sanctuary for his miserably amorous soul.

Because he was undone! Unravelled by the ghost of an Eskimo's kiss and a twist of his left arm. All that 'distant love in the future' idealism went out the window when he felt, with an awful acute sensation, the need to keep Pansy Parkinson's hand firmly clasped in his own.

He flopped back amongst the scarlet covers, mouthing a well-known chorus softly to himself.

_Oh, my poor heart, where has it gone?  
>It's left me for a spell, o'er the fields of Avalon,<br>__Oh, and now you've torn it quite apart.  
><em>_I'll thank you to give me back my heart.  
><em>'_Cause, you've charmed the parts I can't see.  
><em>_You've Charmed the Heart Right Out of Me._

* * *

><p>TBC...<p> 


	9. Chapter 9

**SEVEN YEARS BAD LUCK**

* * *

><p><strong>C<strong>**hapter 9 ~The Rather Glamorous Life of Being on the Pull~**

* * *

><p>Aurors were prided on being great observers.<p>

Well, Neville supposed they were, right after being thought to be ridiculously powerful and full of stealth.

The general public viewed Aurors as glamorous, because being able to enforce the law in a world that lived by arbitrary twisty legislations was very admirable indeed. That much Neville had gathered from Proudfoot's coffee-smattered blathering on daily life as an Auror.

At the start of the program, Neville had begun thinking of himself living life as an Auror. He pretended that he'd already completed the vigorous secretive training course; that he was three years in the future and marching through Hogwarts' halls as a protector, not a student. But nothing really changed with the progression of class, except for having knowledge of both handy and completely illogical spells and a better grasp on how to fill out paper work.

Neville had started to think with a sort of dread that he didn't possess that certain _spark_ for the job, like Harry and Ron seemed to have. Even Malfoy had displayed a rather scrupulous manner to his work, like he had something to prove.

Neville didn't have that, despite living under the Curse of Seven Years Bad Luck for his entire schooling career.

In fact, it wasn't until he had something to protect, something he wanted kept secret and for himself, that he started to feel more like a champion and less like a slumping student sitting in remedial class.

He began sitting up straighter, taking tidier notes, and made sure to salute Proudfoot whenever he saw him (much to the apparent delight of the old Auror).

And Neville didn't think it really mattered all _that_ much that his new-found perfunctory mood was built solely on the fact that he wanted to pull Pansy Parkinson.

The only problem was... He didn't know _how._

He began observing things that never mattered before, looking for clues on how to proceed with satiating the bestial effects of amour.

After classes and on weekends she would sometimes make herself resemble a doll, dark blunt hair and honey eyes with too much makeup. His mind stored away the direction the lace fell on her favourite delicate light pink chemise.

Pansy looked at him more when he combed his hair back. So despite wondering if scars repelled her, he combed it back. Suddenly his fellow Gryffindors, and a couple Hufflepuffs, and even some _professors_ were remarking on the arresting quality of his height and dapper eyebrows, but Pansy never acknowledged the change.

Still, every time she touched him, he remembered _Muggleburn_, a silly game for toddling witches and wizards, and how it had evoked some greater meaning to him; skin seeming to flare to life without using any sort of magic.

He felt like he could— Could spit fire! Roar_._ Grab her and tell just how much he cared! Or, _anything_. However, despite his observations and expert building of the case How to Ask Pansy Parkinson on a Date and Not Get Laughed At, he lacked one key asset.

He became spectacularly tongue-tied whenever she was near.

Pansy's painted nails moved the mirror pieces back and forth too fast for him to keep up. Half the time he didn't think she had a place to put them and was only doing things quicker than him to look like she was better at puzzles.

Neville dragged out another piece and fit it together with one that Pansy had been hording for herself in a pile.

She scowled, but Neville knew she was glad by the way she slowed down to examine it. After a long drawn breath, she set the match aside and kept her eyes trained to the parchment.

"Why didn't you break your curse, Longbottom?"

Neville chewed the inside of his cheek, silently bothered that she still refused to use his first name. "I was uh…afraid to ask for help. Ended up burying the blasted thing, actually." He mumbled.

"Pfft, I can imagine that." She cackled in delight. "You used to make the most hilarious faces when scared! You were so tiny, and round!"

He bristled, feeling flustered. "Er."

Pansy rested her chin against her palm, appraising him. "Would your reflection be there? If you dug it up, I mean."

"I don't know, but," Neville paused, unsure of what she would want to hear but nothing beat honesty.

"I'd much rather see yours."

* * *

><p>They were right up against the holidays, mere days left, and Neville had to give Luna her present. Whenever he'd tried to mail before, his Grandmother's owl had come back with dirigible plum poisoning, so that was out of the question.<p>

He found her in the library early on a Sunday morning, wand tucked behind her ear. She smiled and invited him to sit, which he did, and he did not even feel the urge to ask her when and why she and Ginny had become best friends.

"Thank you so much, Neville." Luna replied, happily looking through the wizarding kaleidoscope. "This is much nicer than what I got you."

"I'll have to wait and see, won't I?" Neville smiled. He liked to keep things wrapped until the actual day.

"Hey Luna," He looked down, fiddling with the thread at the bottom of his sleeve as it unravelled more. He valiantly tried to stuff it back in but the effort was fruitless. His observations had led him to a dead end, and he needed a cure for non-magical tongue-tiedness.

"What do you think about Pansy? Pansy Parkinson."

"She isn't very nice."

"Oh." That was no surprise. "Besides that?"

"She insults people on purpose."

"Besides that."

"She's not brave, and perhaps selfish."

Neville privately thought this wasn't working out well for him. "Besides that."

"She's also lucky."

"Luna," Neville blinked. "You do know how ironic that sounds, right?"

"Yes." She replied and plucked her wand from behind her left ear to practice a charm, revision coming back to attention. "I think Pansy doesn't realize she has someone who cares for her, besides all that."

Luna blinked those dazed silvery eyes and tilted her head, radishes and cork bottle necklace tinkling in an eerie way, as if enchanted. "When she figures it out, it'll be the luckiest she's ever been."

She turned a page in her book and Neville sat, flummoxed. He was completely absorbed in thinking about what Luna had observed that he was startled and knocked over her inkbottle when she chose to speak again.

"Stewart Ackerley had the biggest crush on her two years ago when she grew antlers. Maybe they _did_ add something…"

Neville couldn't conceal a snort of laughter and then let out a tiny horrified, "_Antlers._"

Pince let out a loud _harrumph!_ And wheeled by dangerously close with her squeaky book cart.

Their chuckles became amicable silence until the librarian vanished from sight. Neville was glad for the distraction, glad that Luna was a little bit loony. Some days he felt that way too.

* * *

><p>Of course that meant that Neville had eyed Stewart Ackerley with a forbidding expression during mealtimes the next day. It wasn't until the Ravenclaw had actually asked him if something was wrong after dinner that Neville even noticed he'd been doing it.<p>

Stewart was a nervous sort of looking bloke, and a bit twitchy. Neville recalled him being two or three years younger, a good kid that had been part of the rebellion. But the arbitrary piece of information Luna told him itched like a bad reaction to Wiggentree bark.

"Um," Ackerley continued twitching.

"Sorry about that Stewart," Neville muttered, not sure why he was apologizing in the first place. "Didn't mean to, er, stare."

"Quite all right, I know you're," He glanced around and then whispered. "_Remedial_, 'n all…"

Neville felt stumped.

"Um," Stewart twitched again. "Well, I've meant to talk to you for a while, actually."

"Of course." Neville creased his forehead in confusion. "About what?"

"P-Parkinson, naturally. You two have been, well." Stewart averted his eyes and Neville had the notion that he was trying to hide his intentions. He immediately shook that thought away. He was starting to believe Pansy and her ulterior motive conspiracy.

"Just inquiring about her health. If it's… acceptable?"

Neville idly twirled his wand around in his palm as they walked out the Great Hall. "Pansy's doing fine."

The Ravenclaw boy nodded and turned to go. Something struck Neville.

"The Slytherin table is really empty this year." He said and Stewart looked at him from over one thin shoulder.

Neville coughed and then elaborated. "She could use a friendly face."

Later that day he asked Pansy to come to the Quidditch match right before holidays with him. She said 'no.'

* * *

><p>Neville could have launched a thousand Patronus charms when Pansy showed her face at the Quidditch pitch. Late, of course. He waved at her, smile wide across his half painted in red face.<p>

She was scowling and wearing his wool hat. Neville watched as she elbowed past some firsties making her way towards him. The only damper was that behind her, Stewart Ackerley briskly followed carrying a huge tray of refreshments and candy. The thin boy fought to balance the teetering pile of concessions.

"Don't drop anything!" Pansy ordered waspishly, waving her Slytherin flag, and he nodded with a smile like a camera shutter had just flashed.

"Did you bring the whole kitchens?" He asked and removed his own Gryffindor tambourine from a saved space on the bench next to him. He shrugged helplessly at Ackerley who seemed put out at not having a seat.

"I didn't know what Parkinson liked best." Ackerley simpered towards the sneering girl and Neville crumpled the chocolate frog he'd packed for Pansy inside his pocket.

"I'll give you these Cockroach Clusters if you budge up!" Pansy said acidly, carelessly flinging a packet off the top of Ackerley's teetering tray to the pockmarked third years alongside them. They grappled over it and squashed down.

"_Thank you_, Parkinson!" Stewart beamed and Neville scowled towards the pitch. That chaser's throw had clearly been out of line.

"Who are you cheering for?" Neville asked once she was situated. She was wearing silver earrings in the shape of serpents and had silver and green diamonds painted on her cheek and a dusting of the same colours across her eyelids. He surreptitiously tried to share his blanket and Pansy blatantly tried to steal it.

"Slytherin isn't even playing."

"Honestly, I can't come to a game without house pride. Anyway, I hate to say this, but Gryffindor. I wouldn't cheer for Ravenclaw even if they had _Victor Krum!_"

Neville hid his grin at Ackerley's prim pinched expression.

They watched the game with good airs, Neville beating his tambourine when things became charged and Pansy beating his shoulder to stop beating the tambourine. Ravenclaw beaters made a daring move against the hoops and someone showered Pansy in caramel popped corn causing her to spill her drink.

"ERGH!" It'd been rather sticky popcorn. "Ackerley, go fetch me another drink!"

"B-But the game!"

"If you like me… you'll do it _now!_"

The twitchy Ravenclaw jumped up, oversized empty Slytherin mug in hand.

"And where do you think you're going?" Pansy rounded on him, hard-faced.

Ackerley gulped. "Pardon?"

"Take the _entire_ tray with you. I'm not looking after it!"

The smitten (and rather submissive) Ravenclaw nodded in quick sharp movements and they watched him shuffle down the rickety staircase, wobbling dangerously.

"He's going to miss this next play." Neville didn't feel qualified to comment on anything else.

"He's going to agonize about what I had in that cup." Pansy smirked, smug in her malevolence.

Neville helped her pick off some of the sticky kernels and caught a whiff of her fragrance. It was a good as time as any to try and put his arm around her.

"Did you give me a _boytoy_, Longbottom?" Pansy asked quite inappropriately and frightening him enough to jerk back. She eyed him and Neville pretended to scratch his hair.

"C-Come again?" He spluttered.

Pansy shot him a smirk. "Ackerley."

Oh. Neville ruffled the back of his head and pointedly began shaking the tambourine again. It was an awful sound. "I didn't— You can't _gift_ a person."

High pitched laughter filled his ear and he winced.

"You did, didn't you? You told him something to make him follow me around like a cute little kneazle."

_Cute?_

"I might have." Neville confessed, inspecting the instrument thoroughly and trying to ignore the annoying fluttering in his stomach. Pansy didn't exactly like Ravenclaws and perhaps she was gearing up to have a row. That would explain the sudden ill feeling in his chest.

"He's… nice." He continued, realizing he didn't even know if Stewart truly was. Now he severely doubted it. Stewart Acklerley was a wretched boytoy whose unmatched wit and intellect had sculpted a grand plan to reunite with Pansy. A plan Neville had obviously played right into.

"He lived in the Room of Requirement last year."

The Slytherin girl didn't say anything for a while, and then Neville dropped the tambourine down into the ramparts when she kissed him on the cheek. Her lips came away red.

"Oh well done! I was beginning to think of hexing that thing with a rash." She grinned in triumph, a laugh lifting her lips for just a fraction at his now fully red face. "You've always been thick, Longbottom."

It was a testament to how much he liked her that Neville failed to mention Pansy was a little bit thick too.

He supposed she already knew it, even just a little bit, because she was always putting people down for stupid reasons; for being poor, ugly, or dull; for being smarter, or prettier, or cleverer. People who had more popularity or gold— She didn't waste a moment disparaging even them.

When he'd come to Hogwarts for the first time, it'd felt like he'd drawn the short stick of life because he was not only near-squib, but forgetful and clumsy, and had Seven Years Bad Luck. True to form, she'd taken every shot she got.

But things had changed, and it didn't matter to him what she thought was so wrong with herself to warrant her vicious nature. Did Pansy even have insecurities? He thought she might, but she also showed a lot of pleasure in flinging unwarranted insults and hexes.

He knew she was horribly judgemental. He never understood _why_ when they were children. He thought he might have a damn good understanding of what it was all about now. Pansy needed another person to tell her what she was trying to hide was okay. No one was going to make fun of her for loving the unicorns.

"Pansy, you're—" A gust of cold winter air ghosted past his face, making the imprint of her lips on his cheek flare to life. This was his chance. He was going to compliment her brilliantly. "You're pretty funny to be cute."

Pansy blinked. Damn his jumbled-words syndrome!

"Er," Neville tried again but Pansy just laughed at him, and the opportunity to say anything more was swallowed up by the loud brilliant roar of the stands. Students jumped up all around them, screaming like uprooted baby Mandrakes as the winner was revealed.

Gryffindor had taken the snitch.

* * *

><p>It was just his luck.<p>

Through a series of epic loops, dives and, oh what was the exact name of the move? Ginny had taken the snitch and with it, victory for Gryffindor. She was all grins and receiving rough joyous thumps on the back from the team.

"Come on Nev!" A few Gryffindors in the stands behind him were beyond chuffed and ready to dash back to the common room.

Vicky Frobisher and her friend Eloise turned around from in front of him, colourful red and gold flags stuck into their tightly wound clumps of hair.

"LET'S GO GET SMASHED!" They screamed in unison and Neville was appalled.

"Charming." Pansy's voice was in his ear, but the crowd began pouring out and –he always hated this part– students began pushing and elbowing their way towards the exit.

Someone swung an arm around his neck and it was Dean. Neville's eyes darted frantically, but Pansy was already going down the stairs.

He rushed as best he could towards the ground in the messy crush of Quidditch fans and briefly caught glimpse of her stomping quickly, a few hundred people in front.

Stewart Ackerley was right behind her, waving a sloshing mug and packages of sweets falling across his feet.

"Wait, don't go!" Stewart was trembling and his words sounded like he was talking through a horn, "I can walk you back!"

Pansy disappeared into the crowd.

Neville found himself being dragged off and the next thing he knew there was an explosion of confetti and party tinsel in the air overhead. The Gryffindor common room was packed and the victory party only just beginning.

"Neville!" Luna shouted, gingerly brushing back the mighty tendrils and curls hanging off her lion hat. Ginny turned to him too and he felt amazingly stupid for not saying this sooner.

"You were right." Neville swallowed and Ginny's bright freckled face sobered just a bit.

"I fancy Pansy Parkinson like mad."

There was a pause before:

"I knew it!" Ginny threw her head back and laughed. "Oh Neville, you poor sap."

Neville smiled briefly, her puns were getting better. She _had_ been right. They all had. He just hadn't known it at the time.

He briefly registered Ron and Hermione in the corner hugging and dancing in the rain of golden tinsel and light. He felt his heart squeeze, wishing he could run all the way down to Slytherin and go through that hidden door. Maybe that's why there weren't many (if any) Gryffindor and Slytherin couples. Unless a snake let a lion in, there wouldn't be anywhere for their relationship to go.

Ginny punched him on the arm and he rubbed the spot, watching her slice through the celebration to find whatever she was looking for.

"It's good you finally opened up." Luna said serenely next to him. "All this time she thought you were lying to her. She hates feeling lied to."

He followed her gaze and saw Harry and Ginny having a discussion in the corner, the redhead making grand sweeping and swooping gestures to simulate a broom.

"I never meant for that." Neville replied, not happy with having given off that impression.

Luna gave a whimsical laugh when Dean came up behind her and started drumming on the squishy mane of her hat, "I suppose that's what makes you brave."

He supposed throwing his heart at Pansy Parkinson could have been coined as brave, but he preferred the term _foolish._

* * *

><p>It was the last day before holidays and Neville was in a right strop.<p>

He couldn't find Pansy _anywhere._

He searched all her usual haunts and even checked the Room of Requirement. Coming up dry, he made his way down to the dungeons.

The Slytherin House corridor was bustling with activity, children laying their trunks out for the house elves to take down to the carriages. A young girl with about a hundred braids in her hair was causing a huge scene about Malcolm Baddock's suitcase eating her rabbit.

He spied Draco Malfoy off to the side, casting some seedy-sounding locking charms on all his trunks.

"Excuse me, Mal— Draco, I wondered if—"

"I wouldn't get too close to those if I were you." The white blond interrupted, finishing up with a flourish. "Another wizard touches those and he's going to need Skele-Gro."

Neville _just_ managed to contain a sigh. Slytherins were such gigantic prats sometimes.

"Have you seen Pansy?"

Malfoy crossed his arms. "Come to settle the rumours about the sword, the snake, and the whore?"

Neville blanched. Where did people come up with these things?

"_What?_ That is just blown out of—_No_, I just wondered—"

"Well, can't help you then, Longbottom!" He tipped his head at Neville, "See you in the New Year."

Malfoy started whistling the United Puddlemere anthem as sung by Celestina Warbeck and strutted away.

Trudging in a decidedly more dejected manner, Neville passed the portrait of Headmaster Basil Fronsac who was in a tizzy at all the bustling Slytherin students, yelling about "Wit and Spit!" He took the steps up the dungeon staircase, and spotted the Greengrass sisters at the top.

Neville gave them an imploring look. "Have you seen Pansy?"

The younger one opened her mount petulantly; nose aloft as though to say something astringent, but Daphne stamped on her foot.

"Shut it, Tori! It's more fun this way!"

That was an ill omen if Neville had ever heard one. He reached the top. "What way?"

Daphne shook her head. "Better arm yourself if you intend to find her."

Astoria kicked her sister back. "I was going to say that."

"No you weren't!"

"Yes—"

Slytherins were so unnecessarily vicious. Neville retreated, shuddering, and hurried steps turned into a full out run as he rushed through the propped open main doors, the brilliant early morning light slamming against him like a too-bright bit of magic. He hugged his arms to his chest for lack of coat and scarf and the chill bit like mangy krups nipping at his thin-socked ankles. He cast a warming charm but it didn't do much.

"Slow down, you little git! You're lucky it's holidays! You deserve detention for running like that!" Filch shook a grimy fist at him and Neville sprinted down the salty steps towards the courtyard.

* * *

><p>Neville found her at the top of her hill, throwing rotten pumpkins down at an icy patch of ground. He recognized it as the place where she'd made a snow angel which had long since melted and then filled back in with snow and ice. He watched her chuck one with a sharp twist of her wand and it went <em>splat<em> against the frozen water before skidding away into a heap.

She had the oddest, not to mention slightly gross, hobbies.

"Pansy!"

A butternut squash was hurled at his head. Neville only just ducked.

"Oh, it's you." Pansy noticed, getting up from the snowy seat. There were white clumps all over her bum and he filed it away as the first time he'd ever seen her wearing trousers. Pureblood girls didn't usually give it a try.

Neville grinned. "I thought I would miss you, 'cause, er, I didn't see you down in Slytherin. Your dorm mates are all ready to leave! Have you got the mirror packed up?"

He climbed the steep hill, and Merlin, he was not dressed for this. His feet were encased in snow and resembled those of an abominable snowman by the time he reached the top.

He wrinkled his nose at the crate of pumpkins. "Where'd you get those?"

"The Room of Requirement," She shrugged, and kicked it, causing the whole thing to go careening down the hill into a gory orange mess.

"Er…" He was starting to understand he should have heeded the omen from before.

"Well?" Pansy stood with her hands on her hips. "What do you want?"

Neville stared, mouth falling open. "Want? I…" He licked his suddenly dry chapped lips. "We're going on holiday. I wanted to see you before we left the castle."

His head dropped. "Maybe, you want to sit together on the train?"

"Why?" The sharpness in her voice brought Neville's head back up. "You're chums with Weasley and Loony again, aren't you?"

Neville didn't get it. "Yeah, but… We weren't _not_ friends before. There were just… misunderstandings."

"Oh really?" Pansy began stomping down the hill and Neville struggled to uproot his icicle legs to follow.

"Seemed like you were understanding loads! Seeing how cozy you looked in the library with Loony the other day!"

"Don't call her that." Neville scowled trying to discern what she was mad about. Pansy's face became pointed and white, as if she'd seen a thestral.

"FINE!" She began to stomp faster, sending waves of slush in either direction. "I hate your friends, Longbottom! I bet you don't even tell them to shut up when they call me pug-faced!"

Neville's throat felt prickly and dry. "What? I've never even heard someone say that!"

People merely _thought_ it. He felt lost and confused at her arbitrary barbs. He didn't know how to handle this. It was like getting sprayed with Stinksap for the very first time; her angry words sticking to him and making him feel foul.

"What's wrong?" He tried again. "We can go down to the carriages later and talk about it."

"NO!" She sniffed, long and wet, and hid her face by looking the other way.

Neville grabbed her arm.

"Ow! Let me _go_!"

He did, and she immediately put her hand to where his hand had been in a tight clawing grip.

Neville took a deep breath and stepped closer. When she didn't scream at him again he let it out, a huge puff of smoky air curling around his unprotected head.

"Did I hurt you?" He muttered lowly.

"_Yes._ You're a blithering idiot." She hissed, glaring for all she was worth. "You let Lovegood _steal you_."

"Pansy," His voice went soft and disbelieving and a little bit hopeful. "Are you…jealous?"

"There's nothing to be jealous _of_." She replied, eyes staring off to the side.

Neville might have lost his bad luck, might have done brave things, but he still wasn't completely impervious to implications of his worth (or lack thereof).

He nodded and chewed his bottom lip, sticking his freezing hands into the pockets of his trousers. He was going to catch his death out here. For someone who was jealous and angry for _no reason_. If she was so persistent to act like his enemy, then he might as well leave.

He pulled up his feet and mumbled, "Fine. G'bye, Pansy."

He could feel the hard-faced Slytherin watching him as he walked away, but he'd used up his luck for the day and didn't want to push it. It wasn't right to force his presence on a girl who didn't want it anyway. That was the sort of thing that other guys did. He'd been so foolish. He only wished he knew what had gone wrong.

"Neville!" She hissed with a high-pitched voice from behind.

The hiss of his name scared him into whirling around and Pansy was looking at him with wide owlish eyes, like she hadn't expected it. Her lips pressed together and her eyebrows furrowed.

"Her hair looks like a troll's armpit!" Pansy announced.

Neville stared at her for one long moment, disbelief smacking him in the face. But Pansy continued to look uneasy, and her toe tapped at the frozen dirt and grass of the courtyard like it sometimes did back in Care of Magical Creatures or Herbology class whenever a dangerous specimen was introduced.

He remembered how it used to annoy him, how she used to torment him sometimes when she caught him looking by kicking dirt into the backs of his shoes. But now it only reminded him that she was nervous.

"I don't think there are many naturally blond trolls." Neville grinned but tried to sound disapproving all the same.

She laughed and the sound bounced off the stone pillars of the lonely courtyard. Laughter always found a chance to dance away and find mischief somewhere else.

Pansy rolled her eyes and swiped at them, leaving streaks of black across her cheeks. "You're daft. Hadn't you seen the Carrows?"

He had. Of course he had.

Neville nodded in one quick motion. It was enough invitation for Pansy to stomp forward and take him by the elbow to drag him back inside for warmth, if not with a sort of anxious look in her eyes.

"You're going to be bloody sick through New Year's now." She sniffed, watching the puddle of melted snow form under his feet.

"Maybe." Neville's teeth chattered even as he smiled reassuringly at her. "Or maybe I'll get lucky."

Pansy looked away. "I'm not using the trains. I'm taking the floo home at the Three Broomsticks."

"Oh," He didn't have much to say to that. "Do you mind if I owl you?"

"Yes." She said simply. "I'd hate it if you owled."

Neville nodded, gnarls of panic and disappointment roiling around inside him. "All right then."

"Happy holidays, Pansy." He said and, mustering up blinding courage, he surged forward and hugged her. Perhaps this was the only time, the last time, she would allow it. For some heartbreakingly awful reason, he felt this was as close as he was going to get.

* * *

><p>TBC…<p> 


	10. Chapter 10

**SEVEN YEARS BAD LUCK**

* * *

><p><strong>Chapter 10<strong> **~ All the King's Men Put Them Back Together Again ~**

* * *

><p>Neville Longbottom's ill fate came in the form of a nasty cold.<p>

He'd downed three Pepper-Up potions and used two cheering charms to no swift success. He hid in his bedroom, fearful that Augusta Longbottom would start breaking out the older more nasty remedies up her brocade sleeve. So he spent the first days of the holiday season wrapped in a thick housecoat and his Grandmother's wand stuck deep into his ear to check for temperatures.

"Thick earwax. Not a good sign." Uncle Algie's voice sounded watery and dull through Neville's haze.

"Nothing is ever a good sign with you Algernon. And stop smoking that pipe near him!" Neville earned another good poke with the wand.

"Urgh." He rolled over into a curled lump and cursed his woefully miserable existence. Gran's prudish vexation reminded him horribly of Pansy, minus the hurling of blasting charms, spit balls, and rotten pumpkins.

Merlin help him, he was going to hurl.

He _missed_ her. He'd never longed for anyone in that manner and it tore a strange need in him to do puzzles.

On Christmas day, he'd generally gotten over the cold and was down to a mere trickling of the nose. He even got a chance to venture out into town and made the trip to St. Mungo's in relative peace. New Year's had come and gone, and with it his first time trying Firewhiskey with his Gran's relatives and friends. Those hurling feelings had returned tenfold. Overall, it had been a good if not jolly holiday compared to the sombre one of year's last.

By the time he was back on the train towards Hogwarts, he'd been permitted to wear only two pairs of layered socks instead of four and all was well.

* * *

><p>He and Dean were the first ones to return to the dorm, and Neville spent the rare free time unpacking. Dean lay on his bed, cheerfully lazing away in the throes of rehashing his holiday visit to Seamus Finnigan's home.<p>

Neville was only really half-listening, shamefully, for he was trying to be stealthy in the unpacking of something pink and fluffy. That was, until Dean mentioned only getting to visit at Luna's house for a couple hours.

Something sparked in his mind about Pansy, and Malfoy.

"Hey, Dean…" He started off, not knowing why he thought this was good conversation fodder, "Did you ever see Pansy, at Malfoy's home? You know when…"

"Ah." Dean looked at him sideways and put down the Quibbler issue he'd been gesturing with. "You mean when I was locked up in the dungeons?"

Neville immediately felt awful for asking. Why _did_ they let Malfoy back into school? The _things _that had happened…

But Dean just shrugged and scratched at his cheek. "Yeah, she did visit. Slimy git brought her down to the cells. For gloating, I guess. Luna even said hello! But that's Luna for you, eh? Pansy and Malfoy ended up having an epic row. She got him with a hex that made his teeth into toffee! And then Malfoy got her back with a Mimblewimble so she couldn't talk about what she'd seen. It was pretty hilarious now that I think about it."

"Oh." Neville said. He didn't know what to do with that information. He didn't even know why he'd wanted to know.

"Doing a little recognisance work, huh? Auror background-check on Miss Mimbulus Mimbletonia?" Really, Neville shouldn't have told him that nickname for Pansy. It was private.

Dean started chuckling and put his feet up on the cushions. "I won't forget what she cast that made him flip out though, not in a million years."

"What was that?" Neville asked half-heartedly.

"_Confringo._ Who'd have thought? Parkinson trying to set us misfits free with the Blasting curse. Anyway, I've never seen walls with so much ancient warding on them. No spells worked! Too bad, really."

Neville sat back on his heels. He didn't necessarily believe in the goodness of Pansy's heart, only that he _knew_ she loved blasting charms.

"Hey, now that you know— Do you fancy her more or less?"

Neville resumed the task at hand, using a rolling charm to ball up his socks, but in his anxiousness managed to create one massive ball instead. He groaned and Dean plucked it up to bounce on his knee like those footballers he kept talking about.

"Isn't fancying her at all bad enough?" Neville asked, wanting to poke a wand at the wriggling ball of socks.

Dean passed the ball and rumbled with laughter. "Not really. I reckon that's probably the best part about the whole thing. Actually staying together, now _that's_ the tough bit."

"I, um," Neville kicked at the sock-ball, fighting a blush. "We're not actually_ together_. I just fancy her, bad."

"Are you serious?" Dean sat up, a look of shock all over his face. "Don't tell me you've really _only_ been helping her with that mirror. Are you even attempting to pull?"

"I don't know!" Neville cried and then flung himself like a hippogriff face first into the hard mattress of his bed.

Dean sounded amused. "Don't worry mate! You're date-worthy, you know? When you leave the purple jumpers at home. At least you don't have to contend with Malfoy."

"What do you mean?" Neville was now completely confounded (and definitely rethinking his wardrobe).

"Well, his mum hates her, doesn't she? 'Cause of Harry. And there was a rumour all over school, something about money…"

Neville cursed his ignorance of the rumour mill.

The door to the dormitory burst open, causing both Gryffindors to jump up. The ball of socks exploded, raining down in a colourful shower of plaids, argyles, polka dots, and stripes.

"Guys!" Harry was grinning, arm clasped around Ron's shoulders. "Congratulations are in order!"

"Shut it, Harry, let me tell them!" Ron shrugged out of his best friend's grasp and jumped to stand on the top of his bed, proud fists on his hips and chuffed out of his bloody mind. He started out prolifically even though a purple sock had dropped on his head, "You'll never guess, not in a million years."

"Ronald!" Came a prudish shush and the boys spied Hermione standing at the doorway. Ginny was next to her, fiendish smirk on her face and she scooped up the other girl's wrist, surging into the room and waving it about. There was a glittering in the light.

"They're _engaged!_"

"GIN!" Ron screeched. "You ruined my big announcement!"

"Oh, whatever Ron. It's Hermione's announcement too and you'd have messed up anyhow. Just look at how you _proposed_…"

Neville didn't have time to ponder all which Dean had told him because an impromptu party for Ron and Hermione's engagement erupted just as fast as his socks had.

* * *

><p>For the long weeks as January became February, Ron strut around school like a preening peacock, blue eyes bright because of the successful proposal over the holidays. Neville and Harry trailed behind him on the steps of Gryffindor tower as they made their way towards RATS classes, watching people thump the redhead with congratulations and bid for invitation to what would be a rather wonderful event.<p>

Neville wasn't surprised much, not really. The war had put many things in perspective for couples everywhere and even Harry took time out to visit Teddy Lupin as much as possible.

For the people who expressed their opinion that Ron and Hermione were rushing unnecessarily, Ginny and Harry reminded them they'd been practically married for eight years already and had finally decided to warn others of their dangerously volatile relationship by putting it on official ministry paper.

"The summer, this year." Hermione had said, looking happier than she intended at their compulsion.

Ron had held her hand. "I couldn't go back into fighting to Dark Arts without it being official. Hopefully Auror training will give us all the time off!"

Neville was happy for them, so happy. But their promise of union only amplified the feeling of his own heart falling to pieces.

Because Pansy Parkinson was avoiding him.

He'd known that something would be different, because something changed after that fight on the hill (which had long since blown away). He'd seen a different side of Pansy, and while he didn't resent her jealousy and sudden madness, he knew he couldn't approach her as a meek well-meaning friend anymore. In fact, he was avoiding her as well. She'd rebuked him, told him not to owl her, and hadn't come by to see him after classes once, since before holidays.

On top of all that, Dean kept giving him crazy advice on how to woo, weedy little Stewart Ackerley had a grudge against him for getting his hopes up, and Draco Malfoy was becoming rapidly annoying by asking for Patronus lessons. Neville didn't think he had enough good thoughts to even conjure steam.

Because there was really only one last thing he could do; to put him and Pansy back together like the mirror that had broken in the first place. Neville needed to gather his dwindling courage and hope for luck to be on his side if he ever wanted his wool hat back.

* * *

><p>Neville thought long and hard about it, biding his time. Action planning wasn't his strong point, but like Ron had said; this was war.<p>

First, he was to corner Pansy on the way to the greenhouses. Oh yes, he'd known she had to check on her West African Chilli pods the day before the due date, of which she'd made plainly clear for him to assist. He was sure she wasn't expecting him to help _now_ but those pods were just as much his children as hers. He _deserved_ to see them. And if he just so happened to bump into her at the same time? Well.

All right, so that was all he had for the plan. The rest, he supposed, would probably depend on Pansy.

He took care to bundle up, the weather still cold and sopping wet because of thaw. Neville knew the layouts of the greenhouses like the back of his wand, and… He felt a bit like a lumbering hippogriff crunching around in the exposed dead leaves.

Neville slapped his head and immediately cast a silencing charm and turned his boots into comfortable silent sneakers. Proudfoot would have given him a _Terrible_ had he observed the previous show of stealth.

Much sneakier, Neville peaked inside, and saw Pansy along with Hannah Abbott tending to their projects. Well, _Hannah_ was tending. Pansy was practically stabbing her plant into an early grave.

"Pansy! Afternoon!" Neville said in a loud overly happy tone and let the heavy greenhouse door close behind him with a _whump!_ "You too, Hannah."

Pansy whirled around, eyes flashing when landing upon him.

"Longbottom!" She was apoplectic, brandishing her spade like a wand.

"Hi Neville," Hannah greeted amiably, though nervously eyeing Pansy.

Dismayed by her butchery, he _Expelliarmus'd_ the tool. Huh. He turned it around in his fingers, moist soil crumbling softly in his hand. Hadn't known that would work.

"How dare you!" Pansy pulled out her wand and quickly, he blocked the _Furnunculus _curse thrown in his face.

"I'm faster than you, Pansy." He concluded and it was confirmed when he blocked her next hex to spell his tongue into a horn.

Hannah was clutching her plants with a horrified expression. "Parkinson, you're going to destroy all our midterms!"

"I don't care." Pansy snarled, eyes trained on Neville. "Get out of here gopher, and tell Sprout if you want!"

And Neville would have moved to reassure the blond girl as she threw a tarp over her assignment and ran out of the building; he would have, in a heartbeat, except now things were all sorts of shades of weird.

He couldn't say that he wasn't about to start a huge row with Pansy Parkinson on purpose, because he _was_.

And there _she_ was, eyes flaring with fury, standing with oversized garden gloves on her small hands and dirt on the knees of her stockings whose ends reached the hem of an improperly rolled up skirt; there wasn't much he _could_ say to that picture without sounding like a complete berk.

Pansy made the swish and flick movements of another telltale hex with her wand and Neville _Expelliarmus'd _that too.

The shock that seized Pansy's features made Neville's first instinct to apologize rear its ugly head, but he didn't allow himself time for it. There was hardly anything reliable about Pansy Parkinson, but Neville indeed was faster.

"Ground up fire seeds working?" He stepped up to and around her, looking at the dirt covered counter and into the little pots holding her fledgling grade. The damage from her tending was superficial at best.

"Give me my _wand._" Steam could have been rising from Pansy's head, she was _that_ hot with anger. She practically radiated, rooted to the spot like a poisonous plant daring him to make the wrong move. He'd vexed her perfectly.

"I would if I knew you wouldn't curse me." Neville bit the inside of his cheek, unwilling to give her the satisfaction of bowing to her wrath.

"No? You were _born_ for cursing!"

"Just a little more water and I think you'll have something to be proud of here." He sighed, ignoring her comment and stuck a finger in the soil of one of the pots to be rewarded with feeling a warm environment, perfect for her pods which looked a healthy and deadly bright red. It reminded him of the colour of her lips at the Gryffindor-Ravenclaw Quidditch match and that she wasn't dating Malfoy. And she had_ kissed_ him. Twice. If one counted Eskimo kisses. Neville privately _did_ because two definitely sounded better than one.

"Wait a moment," He turned and held out his empty right hand, palm upwards. Pansy scowled before slapping his hand.

Neville nearly lost his nerve, and fought his stammers to remain firm, grabbing her hand in his with a force he knew she couldn't break away from, "I meant hold out your hand."

Pansy bared her teeth. "Who do you think you are, Longbottom? Let me go."

He supposed she inspired a certain amount of domineering in him. Because if she weren't so bloody prickly and standoffish, he would never have dreamed of holding a woman so forcefully just so he could show her how much he liked her.

Neville blessedly ignored her snarls as he pried her fingers open and forced her to hold her palm up. His other hand raised and she flinched before he tapped her on the head with her own wand, once, twice.

"I want this back."

Pansy's mouth dropped open and leaned backwards as if to protect the wool hat perched on her head. "What? You're going to hold my wand hostage for a stupid hat?"

She made to pull her hand from his but he held fast.

He frowned at her rebellious streak. "No, I don't want to hold your wand hostage. Just promise you won't hex me for the next two minutes, all right?"

Pansy looked conflicted, scowling impeccably but ceasing in her struggling. He took a deep breath and dropped the wand back into her waiting hand.

Her fingers closed around it clumsily and as soon as he let her go, she backed away enough to stow it safely in her pocket and shucked the oversized garden gloves onto the floor. Long bangs hooded her eyes and he noticed that she seemed to have gotten her hair grown, just a little, over the holidays. Or had it really been that long and the time had passed much faster than he'd imagined?

"All right, now my hat." Neville prompted.

Pansy was rubbing her wrist with a funny twist to her mouth. "As much as I like it when you argue with me, you're not getting it back."

A grimace overcame him and they glowered at each other before Neville said, "Trade, then?"

"With what?" She sounded curious but tried not to let it show.

Neville fumbled into his pocket and pulled out something fluffy. He'd bought her a water repellent charmed cashmere hat like his, except in lightest pink at Twilfit and Tattings, London location. He hoped she didn't tear him apart for being late but it wasn't like he could send it. She'd said she would hate his owls.

He held it up for her to see. Pansy's adoration for the chic item was evident by the way her eyes sparkled.

"Oh." She breathed roughly through her nose and Neville could _see_ her warring with a grin. He'd done all right, he could tell.

"…What if I kept _both?_" That was the tone of the Pansy he knew.

He bit his lip to hide his own climbing smile, not taking her bait and trying to sound stern. He took the remaining steps towards her and held it out. "Don't try to negotiate, Pansy. Happy New Year."

Pansy took the gift into her clean small hands. It really was a fetching colour for her. "_Thanks_," Her voice curved around the word like she hadn't meant to say it, and then she followed up with, "Longbottom."

"Neville." He corrected and she snorted, not the least bit contrite.

Things were going great and his heart was soaring with confidence like he'd ingested _Felix Felicis_. And no, he hadn't had Liquid Luck, but one single mouthful of Firewhiskey was about the same, Uncle Algie had said.

She flung the navy wool hat in his face and Neville held it there for just a moment, to hide his expression which was as surely embarrassingly happy as he felt.

And that's when the sprinkler charms went off.

Pansy shrieked and knocked over some poor sod's pot, the ceramic smashing and soil spraying out everywhere. He tried to cast a _Reparo_ but Pansy was grabbing his hand and he found he didn't exactly remember what spell he had to do because he was dragged outside into the dry air. It felt piercingly cold compared to the heat of the greenhouse.

The heavy door clattered close behind them and there was a distinct smell of wet foliage and fertilizer that clung to the inside of his nose.

Pansy was laughing, pink hat covered head thrown back, and Neville blinked through wet clumped eyelashes. When he looked at Pansy, her hair was beautiful and according to her, his was a mess. He didn't care, because she stepped on his foot and told him she'd missed that gormless look.

* * *

><p>He walked her across the fields towards the courtyard, feeling like every step in his squishy shoes was a cloud.<p>

"Oh, hey…" Pansy stopped short and seemed embarrassed and kicked the dirt underfoot fierce enough for it to spray across his pants. "I did get you something too. For Christmas. But it's not as nice."

"Really?" Neville smiled, heart warming, realizing she'd thought about him. "I'd love to have it."

Her eyes slid to the side, glaring at something unknown. "I'm sure you've heard, but my family hasn't much gold anymore, after the war."

He hadn't heard, but staunchly schooled his features to remain neutral, knowing she would find something to get angry about if she thought him making fun of her.

"Anyway, I live in the city, you know, and there're lots of crazy muggle oddities in the shops." She dug around inside her inner pocket. "Since you're a plant-loving bleeding heart and all, I thought you might like these."

She tugged his hand and made him hold it open to drop some strange little amulets attached to strings into his palm.

"What are they?" He held one up by the string, it was green and shaped like a pine tree and— he sniffed— smelt like a pine tree too!

"Muggle tree talismans, I think. They have a nice scent. Mind you, I was all set to put them up in the greenhouse since it smells like dragon dung and rain in there all the time. But you smell like that too, so…"

She stifled a snicker behind one hand when he raised an eyebrow at her.

"They're brilliant."

"Yeah, well," Pansy muttered and then snatched one of the talismans away from him only to hang it around his neck like a necklace. Her nose was squashed like it'd been rubbed in dung, words overly rough.

"You're still going to pay for taking my wand. As punishment, you're coming shopping with me on the Hogsmeade weekend of my choice."

Neville couldn't believe his luck, "Of course I'll go with you."

And just like that, Neville Longbottom got Pansy Parkinson back.

* * *

><p>As all the festive decorations around the castle came down and with the large thaws of spring upon them, up went a string of amulets around Neville's four poster bed.<p>

Neville whistled to himself, slightly out of tune and thinking himself a _genius._ He'd not only successfully given his crush the gift, gotten his own hat back and helped her take a high mark in the Herbology midterm project…

He also had a date with Pansy Parkinson and he hadn't even had to _ask._

Well, all right. According to his dorm mates, it wasn't as much a date as it was a torture session designed to emasculate and then transfigure him into a pack mule. But Neville couldn't see it like that just yet. He was much too excited.

He'd taken to brushing his teeth three times every day in the morning and combing his hair for at least thrice as long. He made sure to double-check the wizarding mirror in the lavatory, just to make sure he wasn't wearing purple and also planned to put on his new dress shoes that Gran had bought him for Christmas when the special day came. A house elf sat gingerly in the corner of the dorms, shining them with a prodigious earwax and elbow grease method.

The only problem was that he didn't know _when_ the date would take place. Pansy hadn't said and then was put in two weeks' detention for breaking Ernie Macmillan's potted Fickle Tickle Fern.

Neville hummed and waved his wand, straightening out two amulets so they were evenly spaced above the headboard.

"I'm telling you Nev, this is just the start to the Enslavement of Neville Longbottom, a good honest chap, really, who didn't know better—"

Neville laughed.

"I'm serious!" Ron laughed with him. "You buy them one expensive gift and they'll expect it every time. You're going to need deep pockets to stay with that one!"

"Oh lighten up, Ron." Harry said from underneath his pillow. It was far too early after all.

Dean came into the dorm, covered in a slight sprinkle of snow and red cheeks. "It's a bit blustery out, but supposed to warm up. Was sitting with Luna. Did you know Ravenclaw's got cinnamon porridge on their breakfast table today? Why do we only get plain?"

Harry groaned and bunched his pillow more. "I don't know how you can get out of the room so early."

Dean just chuckled and tossed his mittens and scarf onto his bed to start gathering his books. "Hey," He paused, staring at Neville's decorating skills. "Why've you got air fresheners hanging off the posts?"

"The talismans?" Neville acknowledged, not really paying attention to Dean's confusion. "It was a gift from Pansy. They're darling, aren't they?"

"_Darling?_" Dean laughed and then began to roll around on his bed, wet jacket and all, when Neville strung one leaf around his neck, smile a mile long.

He hoped Pansy would tell him soon, because for all intents and purposes, Neville Longbottom was pining.

* * *

><p>TBC...<br>I need some time to arrange and write the last few parts of this story (3 or 4 more chapters but don't hold me to that!) and finish my art assignment for a holidays fest I'm in, due November 1st! So, the wait between updates will be a little bit longer than normal, but hopefully everyone will have time to catch up on all the chapters until then! Thank you~


	11. Chapter 11

**SEVEN YEARS BAD LUCK**

* * *

><p><strong>Chapter 11<strong> **~ Neville Longbottom, It's Your Lucky Day ~**

* * *

><p>March arrived, the crispness of spring punctuated by the sharp click of two mirror pieces fitting together as one.<p>

Neville frowned, tinkering with the pieces spread out before him on the large sheet of parchment atop the Great Hall's Gryffindor table.

"That goes there." Ron pointed helpfully, crumbs from a heavily chewed on slice of toast falling onto Neville's shoulder.

"Thanks," Neville replied, rearranging the pieces dutifully and brushing the crumbs away as Ron's appetite was appeased.

Ever since the holidays, school things had been busy thrice over. But in a bizarre streak of good luck, maybe one third of the mirror had been completed! In bits and pieces, mind you, but the match count had gotten lower.

Neville wondered how long and hard Pansy had worked on the mirror over the holidays to achieve such success. Did her family help her? Had she even told them? Everyone in Hogwarts knew, but then again, there wasn't such thing as a secret in Hogwarts. Even if your mother's estranged half-brother was suffering from a bad case of warts on his backside caused by a run-in with a Muggle on Hallowe'en… well, it was public knowledge.

The more he thought about it, he realized he didn't know anything about the Parkinsons or Pansy's life outside school. But it wasn't as if he wanted to poke around to find out more. He didn't have much of a life outside Hogwarts either, and if it were him, he wouldn't have appreciated it if someone snooped into his business and found out about things that, really, didn't necessarily need to be talked about…

Neville swallowed thickly, swirling around one mirror shard with the tip of his finger. It would be better if, somehow, in that hazy dreamlike way, if he and Pansy could have a sort of life outside Hogwarts – together.

They could go out! And dance and try new restaurants with exotic cuisines (Pansy was always complaining about English food being too fattening)! They could go shopping and she was so stylish, perhaps she could help him. On weekends, they could tend to a little garden all of their own and on cozy rainy days, they could have game night and work on putting back the pieces of Pansy's luck.

Wouldn't that be exciting? Wouldn't that be… perfect?

Only – the bottom of his stomach dropped out at the next thought – he was becoming an _Auror._ He would be in training for three years and be _in danger_. What kind of life would that be, really? It was hard enough to ask girls on dates, let alone ask them to wait on him while he served the law as a mistress.

It was so selfish. Neville's piece found its match but the victory was hollow. Maybe it was a good thing he hadn't spilt his guts to Pansy about all the mush and sap mucking around in his heart. If she knew, it would only take all the fears and insecurity he still held onto and churn them into a tight iron knot inside his chest.

"Mr. Longbottom, please _try_ to refrain from working with broken glass at the breakfast table." Headmistress McGonagall ordered with a dismissive wave of her wand causing the parchment to fold itself like a Howler going backwards. She kept walking up through the aisle between Gryffindor and Hufflepuff and magicked a bag in her path under the bench.

"Mr. Templeton, manage that rucksack!"

"Neville," There was an edge to Hermione's voice from his left as Neville watched the hastily refolding document. "For someone with magical bad luck, Pansy certainly is lucky."

Neville knew there was some kind of veiled warning within her words, something to do with the fact that while he bent over Pansy Parkinson's broken mirror, the Slytherin was nowhere to be seen.

In fact, the whole green and silver table was bare as a skeleton that morning. But it wasn't Hermione's fault that she didn't understand.

A year ago that same week three Slytherin underclassmen had been caught hexing Filch for chaining up first years and they'd been punished by the Carrows. It wasn't so strange nowadays; to see empty seats and know that there were events that no one could have stopped, that not everyone knew about, things that needed to be remembered in solitude.

Ron butt in, "Well she's the sort that gets lucky, am I right?" He laughed and nudged Neville in the side.

Neville sighed, amused and affronted on behalf of Pansy's virtue all at once. "She's been having detentions. I just took it to help out."

"I thought Ernie's fern recovered a while ago?" Ginny sat down opposite them looking horribly late, her hair in a messy ponytail and robes slightly askew.

Neville stowed the mirror packet safely in his bag which had a sweet spruce tree amulet hanging off the strap. "Er, detentions for something else."

He didn't want to elaborate on an accident-turned-detention-fodder which involved the statue of Gregory the Smarmy, an owl, and Pansy's robe.

Still, he could feel Hermione's disapproving gaze. Neville privately thought that was a bit hypocritical, considering how much she'd helped Harry, Ron, and himself all through school. In this case, it was just a matter of luck instead of potions lists. Though, a lot of times, hypocrisy was necessary.

Reminded abruptly of the class to come, as soon the Headmistress rounded on the Ravenclaw and Slytherin side, Neville whipped out the Potions assignment Proudfoot would be reviewing (and most likely condescending).

The red mark of an _Exceeds Expectations_ classification on the parchment proudly labelled Neville Longbottom had never looked better. Maybe he'd even get an _Outstanding_ one of these days.

He smiled and read through the list of ingredients, trying to memorize.

"Blimey, Neville, you did so much better than me!" Ron tore the graded sheet away from him to inspect it, and then gave it a frantic wave. "Harry, look at what Nev got! This makes no bloody sense."

Neville could feel his cheeks heating and he groaned as even Hermione snatched the parchment.

"Amazing." She congratulated with a smile, but the other shoe always managed to drop…right about—

Hermione's suspicious hand darted to steal his book bag. "Can I see your textbook? Just… curious."

Ron made an annoyed sound. "Oh, come on!"

An _Accio_ hit the book and it flew out of Hermione's hands straight into Harry's.

"Here, Nev." The bespectacled teen said and shoved the book back into its bag. "Let's get going, we're already late. Malfoy left the hall ages ago."

Neville trudged along in front of Harry and Ron, the mirror packet burning a hole in the back of his mind. When they arrived at class, Draco Malfoy was lazily reclined in his seat watching a dozing Auror Proudfoot asleep on his desk.

"Looks like the staff room coffee supply finally ran dry." Ron lifted an eyebrow.

Harry sent up sparks that zoomed around and exploded overtop Proudfoot's head causing him to jump up, wide awake and sputtering.

Neville smiled behind his hand at the man's bewildered expression and tried to make a mental note to buy some coffee flavoured gummy beans to help wean Proudfoot off the sweet black liquid addiction.

* * *

><p>"There you are, Longbottom!"<p>

The previously thought-of trio of Slytherin underclassmen were cavorting around the portrait of Fronsac. It looked like they'd drawn a pair of rabbits on his canvas and Malcolm Baddock had charmed them animated. Old Basil Fronsac looked appalled as the furry pair frolicked around his long skirts, jumping and tumbling over each other.

"We were starting to miss you around these parts." The smarmy boy grinned and the pair of girls with him snickered.

"I didn't think you would last this long." Astoria Greengrass raised one delicate eyebrow. Neville was starting to believe that Slytherins received secret eyebrow sign language lessons.

"Of course he would." Another pointy girl taller than the rest whispered to her, trying to seem inconspicuous despite her Whomping Willow appearance. "He's a _war hero._"

"Hi, um, thank you." Neville nearly choked on his own incredulity. "Is Pansy in then?"

"Yes and she's covered in filth." Astoria turned up her nose as if she could smell whatever dirt Pansy had been forced to clean up right in front of her.

Malcolm gave a tut of disapproval. "Bloody war. Filch used to be so nice."

Neville had never once heard someone refer to the caretaker as nice. Slytherins were so _weird._ Next they'd tell him Argus Filch _was_ in a committed romance with Madam Pince.

"Is that Longbottom?" A head popped out of the wall. It was Pansy, her face flushed and hair lightly damp, creating a soft clumpy effect compared to the usually smooth straight locks. A tiny bundle of pearlised suds were still stuck frothing on the tip of one ear but she didn't seem to notice. The scent of plum blossoms and freesia was strong.

"Oh!" She spotted him.

Neville waved with a gentle smile creasing his lips. It was starting to melt him a little inside whenever he saw her somewhat out of sorts. She must really have been distracted, because despite the just-showered appearance she was already wearing makeup around her eyes and her bottom lip shone pink.

They staunchly ignored the cheers of the younger Slytherins as the rabbits in the portrait frame multiplied to usurp poor Fronsac and then the horde of furballs began to leap into other neighbouring portraits down the corridor.

Her disembodied head quickly morphed into its usual hard-faced confidence and she stepped out of the magical entrance.

Neville's hand flew to up to cover his eyes. "Pansy, you're _indecent._"

He heard her awful snickers rattle around in his ears.

"What? Longbottom, you ancient prude, I'm wearing a housecoat."

"It's black. And has… _lots of_ _lace._" He said somewhat doubtfully, as he'd never seen a girl in the Gryffindor common room walked around in such a state. And he most definitely was _not_ observing her further through the crack between his fingers—there were delicate _frills _accentuating—No, absolutely not.

Neville hesitantly lowered his hand and saw Pansy with her arms crossed, face clearly full of smug amusement.

"_Lots of lace_ can be used on more than just knickers, you know." She leaned in just a little, making the hairs on the back of Neville's neck rise. "Or maybe you _don't_ know." Pansy laughed loud and obnoxiously high pitched.

"You two make me sick!" Baddock's voice echoed down the hallway from where the mass of painted rabbits were chewing on a tapestry of Salazar Slytherin that was hissing angrily at the tall weedy looking girl.

Astoria cupped her hands around her mouth to shout, "And he's right, you look like a scarlet woman!"

Pansy sneered over her shoulder. "Thanks! Took lessons from your mum!"

Neville blew out a breath and took her by the arm, leading Pansy further down the way so things wouldn't dissolve into a screaming match.

"Why do you two seem to hate each other so much?" He asked as they rounded the corner.

"Tori?" Pansy made a gagging action. "She's a jealous little snot, that's what. Surely you heard about the whole fiasco with Draco."

Neville hadn't and wasn't exactly sure if he wanted to hear it. But his naivety must have shown on his face for Pansy scowled.

"Didn't you? About the arranged marriage and—"

"Nevermind," Neville said quickly, _knowing_ that he didn't want to hear. It was bad enough he had an awful little spinning ball of jealousy forming in his chest, but it wasn't any of his business. Dean had said he didn't have to compete, but from the sound of things it seemed like Pansy wasn't even on the market in the first place.

At that thought, Neville grimaced. She wasn't a piece of fruit.

"Right." Pansy frowned, probably unhappy at her wonderful tirade being cut short. "Did you bring my mirror then?"

"Yes."

She took and held it up against her chin for a moment, tapping the edge of the packet against her lips. Neville watched, almost hypnotically, and felt vaguely stupid for trying to memorize the way her lip gloss left near invisible prints on the parchment.

Pansy spun on her heel towards the Slytherin house entrance and Neville uprooted his suddenly too-large feet to follow. He couldn't stop _staring._ There was something different about her, but he couldn't place it and he had the crushing urge to put his hand in the small of her back.

The smooth –silk?— of her housecoat was a strange and beautiful sight falling in soft folds down to her knees. Quick as lightning, he averted his gaze to the floor, but horrifyingly she caught him staring.

"Shut up. Don't even start." She huffed and looked profoundly angry but sounded embarrassed and Neville braced himself for the start of a quarrel. "I might have put on a few pounds."

Neville blinked, and slowly, with the greatest amount of caution, asked, "Of what?"

"Of _what?_ Merlin, you're slow." She growled. "_Weight_. My bleeding scales malfunctioned to go _backwards_ over the holidays. Really, _this curse!_ Did this happen to you?"

"No." He bit his lip.

Pansy gave a small laugh, chin hidden behind the parchment packet. "Right. Yeah. Almost forgot for a moment…You were _naturally_ a fat cry-baby."

Neville frowned, desperately wanting to ask what she thought of him _now_ but instead, he steeled himself with boldness and said, "We should go to Hogsmeade together next weekend."

An errant animated scrap of canvas hopped by Pansy's foot and she stepped on it, splattering paint all over the stone floors. Bright hazel eyes met his in the darkness of the corridor and despite the furious thumping of his heart, Neville smiled reassuringly at her.

"All right." Pansy's mouth twisted around, like when she was pretending not to like unicorns or fuzzy pink hats. "I'll meet you at the gates first thing on Saturday."

"Deal." Neville's smile split into a grin at that and he waved goodnight to her. Something heavy rolled away, right out of his chest.

"Oh and Longbottom!" Pansy called out to him, her head peaking out of the wall. "Prepare for lace."

She grinned at his likely red face.

"_Lots_ of lace."

* * *

><p>And by 'lots of lace' Pansy had meant being elbow deep in the knickers bin in the Witches' department of Gladrags.<p>

Neville wanted the ground to swallow him up so he could have a beautifully dark anguished place for his manhood to die.

Not that he was all _that_ manly or so unknowledgeable about things of the Witching variety that he was ashamed (for he'd lived with Gran his whole life). It was mostly that there was only so much of female giggling over lacy _underthings_ while he was made to stand vigil he could take.

Ron had been right. Torture.

He'd never felt so out of place before, standing in his shiny dress shoes, hair combed back, and a burning mouthful of Peppermint Perfect Date tablets that he had chewed religiously before giving up. He was standing by his lonesome in the middle of a mass of shoppers holding various pink and cyan paper bags with curly gold designs embossing the front.

Neville had a deep sense of horror-filled recognition that Ron was right about many, many things.

It wasn't exactly his idea of a proper date but perhaps he was wrong. It wasn't like he'd ever been on one before. Perhaps he _was_ an ancient prude, following a code of conduct that had no place on an outing with a Slytherin girl whose possessed Seven Years Bad Luck and a bad attitude.

Bad enough that sodding _Daphne Greengrass_ had come along.

Neville didn't _know_ Daphne, not really, but he'd thought he'd known the most pertinent fact; that she and Pansy weren't friends.

It was starting to look like he was wrong about that too.

"_Neville!_" A cute voice simpered.

Neville closed his eyes and his lips became a defensive thin line as his neck creaked around. Pansy had tricked him a couple of times already with that sweet tone before forcing him to take in the overwhelmingly embarrassing picture of her holding a lacy bustier up to herself, fluttering eyelashes adorably as Daphne laughed and pointed and generally mocked his entirety.

"Yes?" He asked, praying his voice hadn't cracked as much as his courage.

"I'm famished, let's get out of here."

Neville breathed a sigh of utmost relief. "Yes, let's."

Pansy led them outside into the blinding sunlight of the early afternoon sky. Neville shielded his eyes, blinking against it. There was still snow in parts of the cobbled high street and, staying pristine white like only Hogsmeade snow could, it reflected brightly like piles of diamond shavings lying at their feet.

Pansy hummed, walking in front of him. The sugary scented bag of Madam Puddifoot takeaway was starting to make even Neville famished.

For the life of him, he'd thought Pansy wanted to sit in that tea shoppe and spend a lovely afternoon chatting about their feelings. Instead, Pansy had made him stand there in the lobby like a fool waiting while she and Daphne visited the hairdressers for more potions.

He had gratefully accepted the order of tea biscuits that Pansy (and Puddifoot, herself) insisted were better than the desserts served at the Three Broomsticks. Which couldn't have been true, really, Madam Rosmerta served an amazing cherry syrup soda.

Neville blanched, noticing they were missing a person. "Where's Daphne?"

Pansy paused in her stride and Neville came up beside her. "Who cares?"

He wanted to pinch the bridge of his nose, "Are we just ditching her then?"

"Of course." Pansy rolled her eyes. "Well, she's coming to Aurora Allura with us after, but I'm not eating _lunch_ with the cow. Honestly."

The verdict was in. He was never going to understand Slytherin girls. At his presumably gormless look Pansy smirked and grabbed him by the elbow to drag him onwards. They entered the cosy Three Broomsticks, assaulted by the warm air that smelt faintly of butter and sugar and delicious roasted potatoes.

From one of the booths, Neville spied Dean Thomas sitting with Ginny and Luna. The trio caught his eye and they all gave awful cheesy thumbs way up.

Neville gave himself whiplash looking the other way and nearly tripped over Pansy and her annoying tall shoes which made her teeter on the spot when she wasn't moving.

She snarled and pushed him towards a table. "Get going!"

As soon as they were situated, Pansy wiggled her toes, just visible through the tips of the fancy silver rhinestoned pumps. They were much nicer than the ones Madam Rosmerta sometimes wore during the holidays.

"Aren't you cold?" Neville probed for probably the seventh time after they ordered. Her tiny toes looked increasingly blue each time he checked. He tried to not seem like he was punching the shopping bags to get more arm-space.

"It's a warm spell." Pansy huffed. "I'm dressed for the occasion."

Which meant, he assumed, not being dressed at all.

Whereas normal sane people were still wearing jackets and thick socks, Pansy decided she would choose _today_ of all days to go stockingless in a short black skirt.

Not that he didn't… appreciate… Anyway.

"If you do get cold, tell me. I'm wearing two pairs of socks right now and I don't mind—"

Pansy kicked him in the shin. "Damn, Longbottom. Why don't you call an elf to take those bags instead of smashing them?"

Neville flummoxed with the cutlery. Why hadn't he thought of that?

Of course they'd only hit the tip of the iceberg as Dean found his merry way towards their table.

"Afternoon, there!"

"Dean," Neville said. He was half relieved and half mortified he'd come 'round to watch Neville crash and burn. "Enjoying yourself?"

"Oh yeah," Dean moseyed around, "Just… coming to say hello to you and your beautiful companion." Pansy was grinning toothily now behind her water goblet.

Manners came before sudden embarrassment-induced combustion.

"Pansy you know Dean Thomas, don't you?" He smiled in a way that he hoped could somehow distract Pansy from finding any insults to make.

"Thomas." She said simply, then rose one eyebrow and made a face and laughed. "That sounds beyond silly. Who has a first name as their last?"

Dean didn't take offence, he rarely did actually, and the side of his mouth quirked up into amusement. "I suppose someone with a Muggle stepfather would, but don't hold me to that."

Pansy just tilted her head, chin resting against one upturned palm, and Neville thought she looked rather coy with her eyelashes lowered at Dean. She kicked him in the ankle this time, causing the plates to clatter conspicuously as Neville grit his teeth against the sharp pain.

"I'll just call you Dean then."

"Pansy." Dean tipped his head, smiling.

"Neville?" Neville tried valiantly.

"Longbottom." Pansy smirked fully then, and he felt the long thin heel of her pump drag ruthlessly up to his knee.

"We're all heading back up to the castle now. Killer Charms essay, you know." Dean said unnecessarily dragging out Neville's demise.

"Say _Dean_," Pansy waggled her eyelashes, one of the silliest eye-flirting techniques invented. "Longbottom and I are staying longer. Since you're making the trip already, do you mind terribly taking my bags up too?"

Dean's winning smile wavered. "Huh?"

Pansy raised an eyebrow almost imperceptively at Neville before carrying on in her simpering. "_Please?_"

"Oh, uh," Dean turned back on the charm. He always had trouble saying no. "I could do that."

"Thanks!" Pansy chirped, grin terrifying as she levitated the mass of bags straight atop Dean. He barely had time to catch them all.

"Nnff problff." Dean acquiesced.

"You can put them on Longbottom's bed! I'll collect them later."

Neville could have died and weakly, he said, "Oh look, our meals have arrived."

Pansy took pity on Neville, for _once_, and ceased her silly eye-flirting. "_Finally!_ I'm starved."

He could see out the corner of his eye, Ginny red in the face from held-in laughter and making lasso wand movements as if trying to corral Dean back into their booth. Neville was tempted to do it for her himself. Luna merely looked dazed.

Neville sighed. Why, oh, why? Why couldn't they have sent Luna?

"You enjoyed that, didn't you?" He asked her knowingly.

"So. Much." Pansy grinned and stabbed one luscious looking potato with a fork. "And now you don't have to lug parcels dopily like a mule. Hurry up, we're meeting Daphne in an hour!"

Neville felt her dangerous high heel nudge him again and, intending to keep on equal footing, he nudged back.

Pansy smiled behind her water goblet.

* * *

><p>Entering Aurora Allura was an assault on the senses. A corner shop off a side road from the high street, it was run by Madam Aurora, a large woman (in mostly girth rather than height). Her hair was always cut into the latest Celestina Warbeck style and she was recognisable by her bright sky blue lips.<p>

It was a cosmetic store to bring about a glorious end to all teenage girls as they stepped into a miraculous heaven of fragrances, bold colours, intricate bottles, and glitter that seemed to rain down each time someone shrieked or squealed.

Neville had the sneaking suspicion he'd been laughed at by a homeless wizard with no teeth as he had held the twinkly door open for Pansy and Daphne.

Neville sneezed, sensitive nose assaulted by all different scents. He trailed along behind the two Slytherin girls as they walked down the aisles between the brightly lit counters.

"I need to add new colour to my life!" Pansy lamented, waving hands dramatically as if she were warbling like Warbeck herself. "My life is so _drab_ lately."

"Drab?" Daphne replied snidely. "If that's what you call those tacky shoes and ensemble I don't want to be around you when you're not. Honestly, you can't afford to overdo it anymore."

"Today is different." Pansy sneered and Neville hung back even farther, though he didn't want to get lost in the labyrinth of powders they'd just encountered. He watched the girls spin the many spiral towers in quick succession, picking up various small pots at random and opening lids to take sniffs or using cotton swabs to rub the stuff all over their wrists.

"You do it _all the_ _time_. Ordering custom robes when your family can't even—" Daphne cut herself off before hissing out, "Does he even know about—"

Pansy used one finger to smear a stripe of bright blood red cream powder right across Daphne's forehead and nose in the form of an _X._

"Oops." Pansy smiled cruelly. "Looks like you need a mirror."

Daphne stood there, mouth agape as though she hadn't expected to be drawn on in a million years. Neville privately thought she should have seen it coming, as a Slytherin. Poor Headmaster Fronsac refused to return to his frame.

"_So do you!"_ She squealed in anger and glitter rained down.

"Come on Longbottom, this way!" Pansy rounded on him and he had no choice but to follow her lest he want the other Slytherin to glare him into the grave.

"Next time don't invite her." Neville whispered as Pansy steered them towards the counter where Madam Aurora was helping an elderly witch choose a shade of lip colour. He had nothing against Daphne Greengrass, only that she was very much a thorn in both their sides today.

"Oh," Pansy looked at him then, and she was nearly his height with those shoes, "You silly, silly boy."

She patted his cheek which felt hot. Neville touched his face in an almost frightened manner when her palm left.

"Now _you're_ going to have to be my partner in crime." Pansy plucked a tube of lipstick off the tray and spread it across her lips. She pressed her lips together, her mouth sliding easily into a bright pink smile. "Or better yet… test subject!"

"Wh-What?" Neville gaped, and quite possibly shrieked when Pansy surged forward and planted one right on that burning cheek.

Neville gaped down at her and Pansy looked completely breathtakingly devious, purple and red glitter caught in her eyelashes.

"Oh, my!" A warm jovial voice seeped its way into Neville's ear like caramel. He barely twitched as Madam Aurora appeared at their side of the counter, bright blue lips stretched wide in a welcoming smile.

"Now, dear, I don't know if that's the right shade for him."

Pansy cackled in delight. "It'll be a lucky day if we found something for his brainless mug. Well, what do you think?"

"Uh…" Neville blinked.

Pansy snorted, biting her lip to hold back more evil laughter. "All right, let me try this one…" Her finger combed through the tray.

A complete fireworks show of heat and energy and _anticipation _crackled inside him. Neville had the crazy notion that if he even so much as opened his mouth, a rocket of colourful light and sound would come shooting out. So he nodded dumbly when both Pansy and Madam Aurora looked at him as though they'd asked a question.

The touch of her lips against his other cheek was shocking and electric, but at the same time soft and warm. He acutely became embarrassed he hadn't shaved that close and she was going to feel it. But the feeling that trumped all insecurities and doubt was the bubbling crazy sensation of '_Yes!'_ coming from his heart.

"Pansy!" It was Daphne who gasped, appalled and borderline scandalised, red X still bright as could be on her face.

"What?" Pansy said, rudely carefree; probably drunk off beauty. Neville rather believed he was as well.

She kept on snickering and did it again, this time with a glimmering shade of gold that made her look like Cleopatra or some other-worldly woman instead of a schoolgirl with a somewhat pug nose.

"_Pansy!_ Stop it! You're going to make him think—" The beady-eyed blond caught his eye then reached out and squeezed Pansy by the upper arm, tugging her away into the racks that held hundreds of false spider leg eyelashes. Certainly a Ron Weasley nightmare waiting to happen.

Madam Aurora smiled indulgently from behind the counter, her giant crow's feet creasing like folds of chocolate. "Your girlfriend is certainly… vivacious."

Neville chuckled but inwardly didn't think that was quite the right word for it. Girlfriend.

"So which one will it be?" The woman smiled, plump blue lips creating a pleasant bow.

"Oh, uh," He stammered, examining the tubes of colour.

Madam Aurora wordlessly levitated a gilded mirror. Neville swallowed and felt that perhaps he wasn't the best test subject after all. His skin was the colour of freshly split tomatoes.

He was in the middle of saying thank you to the cheerful Madam when Pansy came barrelling from the racks of eyelashes, laughter lighting up her whole face.

"Hey," She said and in reply he grabbed Pansy by the hand and pulled her forward, waving the intricate embossed paper bag in front of her.

"I hope you don't have this one already."

Pansy blinked, nose scrunched in one confused second that melted his heart completely. "Come on!"

She strode towards the exit and as they were leaving, Neville looked over his shoulder and saw Daphne Greengrass speaking to Madam Aurora. The older woman was helping her remove the makeup_ X_ and when Daphne smiled back in politeness, she had a mouthful of toffee teeth.

He felt the tiniest bit awful for grinning.

* * *

><p>"You didn't have to buy anything," Pansy said, even though he could tell she liked it as she insisted on holding <em>that<em> bag. "I never do."

She smirked purposely as the twinkling door clattered shut behind them. They made their way back up to the high street, hearing the happy shouts and chatter of Hogwarts students echoing off the twisty slanted rooftops of the town.

"I just like to test out all the new lines and write scathing comments to Katherine Krimple."

Neville made a strangled noise as she pinched him hard on the cheek as they passed the Sports shoppe.

"And to make a mess of boys' faces!" Her eyebrow rose and chin tilted up as if expecting him to comment. He knew she was looking at the faint lines of the scars on his face and not the traces of colour still lingering on his cheeks even after a sturdy _Scourgify_.

"The cosmetics columnist in Witch Weekly." Neville nodded, half smile climbing up as he rubbed his smarting cheek. "Does she ever reply?"

Pansy looked pleasantly shocked at his knowledge. "Reply? I swear she's a _thief!_ Plagiarising my reviews with the sappy drivel she writes."

"Then why write her at all?"

"Well," Pansy's smirk became tighter. "It's good to know someone's listening."

Neville opened his mouth to say… well, actually what he had in mind was too corny. But how could he explain it all in detail? That _he_ was listening, truly listening, without sounding like a complete berk? He was, though. And he knew his friends thought he was crazy for liking _Pansy Parkinson _because, to most people, she was disgustingly mean.

Her true self supposedly held a hairy heart, incapable of doing more than growing a thick coat of ugliness around it; an awful person, underneath everything. But Neville could poke fun at that. Underneath? Pansy wore her mean streak proudly like he did with scars after the war.

Besides it all, she did things with him that no other girl had before, like laugh at all his jokes, drag him places by the hand, kiss him… Like how she cried about her hair catching on fire while laughing at Hermione about hers. Even when she meaninglessly hexed people, tried to _throw them away_—

It was all so preciously hypocritical, so real and confusing— and yes, exciting. He didn't think about the stupid things people were afraid or hateful of when they spoke of her. He was with Pansy almost every day.

He didn't have to think about how she _truly_ was. He _knew._

"Oh Circe! Quick, we've got to hide me!" She cursed with slit eyes, stopping dead in the road so fast that Neville slammed into her.

"I, uh, know a great disillusion spell. Full of stealth!" He mumbled into the top of her head.

There was a squeak that sounded a bit like a mouse.

Pansy groaned.

Stewart Ackerley stood in front of them, hands full of Honeydukes packages. He twitched once, twice, and then the colourful treats hit the ground as he ran the other way, making an incomprehensible sound of anguish.

"It's all your fault, Longbottom." Pansy said, but looked at him, smirk curling up underneath that snubbed nose.

* * *

><p>Neville didn't know how she did it (and really, that wasn't at all good considering he was an Auror-in-training) but Pansy had somehow stolen the mittens right out of his jacket pocket.<p>

She was wearing them plainly as they made the trek back up to the castle. Since when had plain-faced villainy been so charming to him? It didn't feel like he'd changed his moral compass, but then again, it didn't help that she looked cute in his oversized things.

Of course, they'd missed the crowd by returning late, but there was the odd straggler student who would stare at them until Pansy threatened to throw hexes. Neville didn't think it was so odd, the two of them, not now after so many months of being friends. It wasn't even like she was holding his hand.

Pansy walked at least a yard behind him, head held aloft even as she picked her wobbly way across the uneven spring-thawed ground. Coming down the hill hadn't been much of a problem in the morning, going _up _though…

Neville frowned, turning to walk backwards and then stopped completely to see her struggling to catch up, thin knees a dark bruised colour from the cold breeze.

"Hey, Pansy, let's just _Apparate_ to the wards from here, it gets even muddier up the trail."

"_No_, I can't Disapparate and land on uneven ground yet." She panted, annoyed at the admission. "Trust me, I tried over the holidays. Just sit. I'm tired."

"We could _side-along_…"

One glare and a histrionic huff as she sat on a tree stump answered that.

Pansy rotated her ankles and got bored quickly, the rustling of crinkly gift paper alerting Neville to her inspection of the lipstick from Aurora Allura.

"_Kupid's Kiss_." She candidly read off the label. Neville rather thought she didn't need it to look kissable.

"Interesting choice. All right," Pansy grinned wickedly, and plucked the cap off the tube in one giant mitten. "Come here, let's test it out."

Neville sucked in a little breath, biting his lower lip. "What?"

All he got was a slight cock of her head and a coy smile. The Slytherin girl stood up balancing back and forth on her heels and pulled off the stolen woollen mittens.

He plodded forward and felt courage building up in thick layers of something sweet, like too much frosting on a cake; his hands were suddenly freezing so he shoved them in his coat pockets. Pansy tapped the little tube against her chin like she sometimes did with her wand and then crooked a finger at him.

Neville smiled hesitantly, nervous, because no one was around this time. He leaned down and offered her his cheek.

She laughed at him. "I haven't even put it on yet."

And he felt like a fool but a happy fool because she stepped into him and took hold of his chin which twitched under the oddly warm tips of her fingers.

He watched the crème stick of colour swivel up with anticipation. Pansy lifted it in between their faces and Neville took a shallow breath and—

She put a thick luscious swipe of colour right across Neville's bottom lip.

"_Pansy._" He breathed in sudden mortification and tried to jerk back.

Pansy laughed into his face, spider-like fingers crawling up to hold his cheeks together. "Don't _move._ I'm not finished."

His mouth dropped in disbelief and Pansy squished, forcing him to pout.

"P-Pansy!" He tried again but merely got a full mouth of lipstick instead. He stared at her, the cunning wicked witch, grinning at him like she was holding onto the best joke of her life.

Pansy let his face go and then immediately grabbed his hand so he didn't swipe at his lips. He looked down. He hadn't even realized she'd known he was left-handed.

"Well," He pressed his lips together, feeling them slide. "What do you think?"

Pansy lifted her chin and their eyes caught together. They were standing so close Neville could see himself in those big hazel eyes. Did he really look like that? With that gormless expression and—

Pansy lifted up and pressed her lips to Neville's, and they felt just as kissable as they looked.

Neville made a sound of surprise in the back of his throat. Pansy bit his bottom lip, just a little, to loosen his pursed stance before her black eyelashes fluttered closed and she flung her arms with far too much elbow around his neck.

It was astounding. He never expected _Pansy_ to— her warm mouth slanted against his own and Neville let his eyes fall shut. Pansy's nails tightly pressed into his chest and it _hurt_ so he gripped her by the upper arms. His mouth fell open when both her hands went to his cheeks instead and pulled down. She stole his breath and bottom lip as she sucked on it and then licked her way down the roof of his mouth.

It was a singular open kiss that imitated the feeling of a piece of delicious chocolate melting slowly on his tongue. It was a thousand fireworks rocketing off in all directions and illuminating him from the inside out. Neville pulled her as close as he dared, hoping she could understand what it all meant, because he hadn't a clue.

Pansy's breath left in a rush of warm fizzyness across his lips as she leaned back and he quickly let her go, not wanting to crowd her. She smirked at him, mouth smudged and red. Neville breathed roughly through red lips of the same shade and he didn't dare blink, couldn't really, because he was in disbelief.

"Pa—"

"_OOMF!"_

And of course, as luck would have it, that's when the dangerously tall heel on Pansy's pump broke off.

She toppled backwards over the tree stump.

"Merlin's beard!" Neville cursed, and Pansy was just a pair of long legs and a twisted foot at an odd angle. She began to scream in fury.

"I can't _BELIEVE_ that just—"

Neville hurried to help her but all the angry flailing was a bit terrifying.

"Ow, ow, ow. Bloody hell!" Pansy shouted, eyes wide in terror when she caught sight of her foot. Neville gulped, irrationally afraid she would never walk again.

"My _shoes!_ They're ruined!"

Neville could have hit his head against a stone wall. "Never mind those. Look at your ankle!" The black and blue blossoming on her ankle was making him feel queasy.

"I _see_ it underneath the carnage of my shoe." She looked about ready to cry.

He sat her on the stump and gingerly held the puffy joint. "Pansy, this looks bad. Why did you need such high heels anyway?"

"As if I'd come to a date looking like a pauper."

Neville mind paused indefinitely at that, something fluttering madly inside his stomach. She shot a pained _Episky_ at the ankle.

"Shiiite," She hissed, putting weight on it. "I think it worked. Still hurts like a bitch though. You're an Auror, aren't you? Do me a pain-killer charm or something else clever!"

"Oh, er," Neville was dismayed, "Poundfoot doesn't have clearance to teach us healing magic."

Pansy stared at him and he looked back imploringly until she laughed, a little breathless. "_Poundfoot._"

"I'm starting to think your curse likes to go _bare_foot." Neville couldn't help smiling, her laughter was infectious, her new-found ease with ill fortune endearing.

"Obviously I'm meant to walk on the wild side."

"Now you can't even walk."

Pansy gave him a wobbly furious look that said very well what she thought of his intelligence. "Shut up, Longbottom. I'm ace at _Episky,_ you complete idiot."

She shoved him in the same mouth where hers had been before and got up to limp her way through the mud in an amazing attempt at being tough. She did things like that when she was embarrassed. The fact that she made a disgusted and terrified sound each time mud squelched in between her toes didn't help her case.

"Pansy, slow down!" Neville followed her carefully through the mud, exasperated and so terribly smitten.

One of her shoes came off with the next step. Pansy screeched, balancing on the one good foot and then, there was a great disgusting—_fwolp!—_sound.

The two of them looked down to witness the sticky dark brown mud swallow her miserable shoe.

Before Pansy could start tearing into the fifty-two reasons why her life was unfair, Neville tracked straight through the mud puddle, destroying his own dress shoes in the process of sweeping her up into his arms.

"Are you mad?" She cried, hanging onto his neck for dear life. Neville couldn't help the sheepish grin that formed as she kicked and screamed; he kind of liked her like this.

Who was he kidding?

She'd just put lipstick on _him_ so she could humiliate and kiss him all at the same time.

He kind of loved her like this.

"Ssh." Neville put his nose on her head, leaving a ghost of an Eskimo's kiss lost somewhere in that soft dark hair. The scent of her fragrance was intoxicating and Pansy ceased her struggling, punctuated with a few great cuffs to the side of his head.

He couldn't very well ask her if this made them boyfriend and girlfriend. All that mattered was that everything was so typically _Neville and Pansy_. He wanted to say something without stuttering like a gigantic prat, but didn't know what to say.

"Hand me your wand." He suggested, and Pansy clocked him in the chin with her head reaching for his instead. He valiantly stood ground, holding back all of the brilliantly embarrassing things he could say with her hand in his inner pocket.

Neville balanced her in the crook of one arm for just a moment, wand held up, and turning on his heel they disappeared with a loud – _Crack!_

They reappeared at the foot of the Hogwarts gates and Pansy didn't even mask her attempt to elbow him in the jaw, shrieking.

"You could've _warned_ me. Merlin, I'm going to be ill!"

"Come on, Pansy you can't walk. I'm carrying you back to Hogwarts."

"I can _see _that." Her hazel eyes flashed but her cheeks were rosy. Neville began the uphill trudge.

"Lift me higher!" Pansy ordered in an imperious tone, mouth twisting around as though she hated him for wanting to make her smile. She settled on a smug look before whispering into his ear as he walked:

"I'm getting wind up my skirt, Neville Longbottom. Don't even _think_ about letting someone see my lace."

The blood rushed to his face and ears so quickly Neville sputtered in embarrassment. _Slytherins._ They always had to have the last word.

It didn't matter.

It was Neville's lucky day.

* * *

><p>TBC...<p> 


	12. Chapter 12

**SEVEN YEARS BAD LUCK**

* * *

><p><strong>Chapter 12<strong> **~ The Illusionary Art of Smoke and Mirrors ~**

* * *

><p>"And just where do you think you're going?"<p>

Neville's muddy dress shoes clomped against the cold stone of the Hogwarts floors in a strong steady rhythm.

Pansy Parkinson was light and perfectly unable at keeping still in his arms. He'd put a hover charm in place to help keep her steady. Really, he shouldn't have believed her when about that extra stone.

_Girls._

He smiled a little to himself as he replied, "To the Infirmary."

"No. No, absolutely not! I'm _healed!_" Pansy glared from the cradle of his arms and kicked out as if to prove her point, accidently striking a suit of arms with her foot.

"Owww…"

He looked at her, incredulous. "Do you want to try walking then?"

The suit shook a menacing fist at them, clanging angrily at being disturbed.

There was a snort.

"I'll stay right where I am, thanks. Today is not my lucky day."

Neville frowned and stopped his marching. Sudden realization hit him like a hex taken head on.

Pansy was _cursed._

How stupid could he be, really? Considering he'd had the _exact same one!_

How long had he gone through the motions of everyday life thinking and saying _'Why me!'_ when he knew the answer to exactly that? Deeply he knew the fear of bad luck falling into his lap during the most unexpected moments. He'd likened it to a dark boggart-like being that hid in the shadows, watching him and expecting him to mess everything up. It's why Professor Snape had been the perfect face for such an odd and specific fear.

Neville bit his lip. Did she think of him as just another annoying part of her bad luck? Was the reason he had become drawn to her, because Lady Luck had decided to kill two birds with one spell? Maybe he'd never been cursed at all, those previous seven years, and only now it'd decided to kick in.

The overall logistics of their situation had never appeared so starkly in focus to him before.

Pansy's bad luck was _his_ good.

Was he some kind of burden to her? Or worse, was he actually just some kind of awful troll in her eyes, who'd come to latch onto her with clumsy schoolboy advances which she pretended weren't so bad, because he was too stupid to see what was really going on? The thought put a feeling of unease in the pit of his stomach.

Did she only kiss him because she thought she was being funny? _Kupid's Kiss. Test it out._

He wondered fervently what on earth she could have said to explain herself afterwards; if luck had not intervened. Neville knew his own feelings well, but he couldn't exactly start to project those emotions onto Pansy. He couldn't start believing things that weren't true.

It was like during the last year, in the Room of Requirement, when he explained what scars meant but no one truly understood until they had their own. You had to _live_ with some things to truly _know_.

In war, second-hand emotions don't even exist. And like Ron said, this was war.

There were a lot of things he didn't know about Pansy Parkinson, but he had been rather certain her waters didn't run so deep as to hold onto things she didn't want. She wasn't like him, stuffing candy wrappers to fill entire drawers and planting feelings into neatly tended garden rows in his mind.

Mysterious and sassy she may be, but he'd always thought she was a bit like a teaspoon when it came to things like that. No emotional room for much except what she could hold in her hands. If she didn't like something, she dropped it.

Neville held onto Pansy tighter and tried to use his stealthy Auror skills to examine her face in realization's new light.

Pansy was looking at him with a perplexed expression. "Longbottom, don't tell me you're tired of carrying me."

Never. He'd carry her for as long as she'd allow it.

There was a distinct yet sloppy feeling of his heart turning to mush and his carefully built courage melting away at the thought of _her_ dropping him.

"You're getting heavy. It must be that extra stone."

"You prat!" She slapped him on the chest. "I'm as light as a feather compared to you. Get a move on!"

Seriously, he was really starting to believe she said things just to get him to argue.

"To see Madam Pomfrey then?"

She pinched him, and thankfully he knew she'd done it only because her kicks would go nowhere near his ankles.

Despite her petulant attitude, he _couldn't _argue when her arms clenched firmly around his neck. Pansy shifted and the crown of her head touched his chin. Neville tightened his grip where he supported her by the back and underneath her knees.

Bad luck could step in their way at any moment. He had to stop hemming and hawing over what to do. He couldn't just keep walking around in circles with Pansy, both of them strung together by the impermanent knot of luck's string. If something snapped between them, then he would lose her.

If he wanted her— truly wanted her— then he could not let them balance on the foundation of one precarious kiss. No friendly rapport, cute Christmas gifts or promise of mending mirrors would be able to keep them together.

Neville renewed a vigorous march and Pansy chattered about gossipy things that he had never paid attention to before.

But now, basted with the need to understand Pansy, her words sounded to him like they came from very far away and he was desperately listening through an old brass ear horn.

He heard her say things about how Malfoy refused to go to the Three Broomsticks, and that she thought the '_Golden trio'_ was following him. She was _suspicious_. Neville knew she meant 'worried.'

Things about how the gossip _wasn't true_ and it wasn't her fault that Mrs. Malfoy was fickle about future-daughter-in-laws having to be self-sacrificing chits (preferably without their own tongues.) Apparently, a _lot_ of sassy young witches had the tendency to blurt things like _'Grab him!' _in the Great Hall without thinking of the real dangers to words like that.

He heard things about how Daphne Greengrass always fancied the '_wrong sort'_ and somewhere outside of his stirred thoughts, he was replying to Pansy with—

"So what's the wrong sort?"

Pansy seemed momentarily derailed from her prattle.

"Wrong sort of what?"

"The sort to fancy."

"Oh. Well, you know— Geeks, Gryffindors, guys who already have girls… That old tripe."

"Don't girls _usually_ go for the bad ones?"

"Yes." She grinned at him.

Pansy laughed, and its sound was a clear bell, wringing him free of his mental rearranging. He walked them down the corridor which led towards the castle exit nearest to the greenhouses. A line of young Hufflepuffs were walking the opposite way, following behind Professor Sprout like tiny goslings, each carrying an oversized potted plant just like how he carried Pansy.

The Head of House smiled at him with a toothy grin and rosy cheeks. Professor Sprout tipped her tall hat-covered head as they passed each other in the hall.

"Her hat is atrocious." Pansy said under her breath.

Nothing had ever been so certain. He had to be brave.

"Pansy," Neville took a deep breath. "I think it's about time you call me Neville."

"And why's that?"

There was a pause as he waited for the last tittering young student to empty the corridor.

"Because I'm going to kiss you now."

And then for all his bravery, Neville gulped. With supreme awkwardness. Really, it shouldn't have been that daunting after saying it out loud.

Pansy stared at him with one eyebrow arched high.

"All right, Neville," She said slowly, in the same twisted way she said his surname. It sent a shiver up his spine.

"You realize your lipstick's smudged?"

"What—"

"Mmn," Pansy pulled herself up to place a kiss on the confused line of his mouth.

Her hands tunnelled into the hair and the back of his head, tilting it just so. Her body seemed so small in his hands now, compared to the hard-edged confidence she walked around with in daily life that seemed about a mile-wide. Merlin, but she was warm and solid. He pressed back softly on her lips, not really trusting himself to get too experimental considering, oh—wow— Pansy liked to _bite_, but it was good, so good. His toes felt like individual firecrackers, like slivers of paper peeling back into hot curls after having been lit and his body was the smoke that trailed away.

When they parted, a few pieces of hair had fallen into his eyes. Pansy pushed them back, her fingers lingering in the dark brown locks.

"Where do you want to go?" He wanted to do anything for her.

Pansy gave him a deviant look. "My shopping bags _are_ on your bed…"

"Er," Neville staunchly did not think about his bed and Pansy. Instead his mind filled with vast rows of stairs. Stairs upon stairs upon stairs with a banister made of lace going upward to an unknown point.

She dissolved into mindless cackles at the expression of horror he wore.

He never thought he'd say this in all his years at Hogwarts:

"Let's just go to Slytherin."

* * *

><p>"<em>Hey!"<em>

As soon as Pansy had directed him through the door, Astoria Greengrass was jumping up and shouting.

Neville wanted to tell the girl in his arms 'I told you so,' but he wasn't exactly that type. He gulped and tensed, readying himself to be thrown out of Slytherin instead.

"He can't be in here! No outsider's been inside for over seven centuries! What are you—"

"Oh, stuff it Tori!" Pansy flailed her good leg in the younger Slytherin's general direction, which happened to be a cluster of underclassmen on the leather sofas near a fireplace hearth. She sent clods of dried mud flying everywhere.

"I'm bad luck! Cursed! Don't make me come over there."

Neville stood there under the multitudes of silver lanterns that hung from the low ceilings feeling like an epically embarrassed tree which had caught a wild Pansy in its branches.

"I'll get it all over you too!" She imperiously kicked off the remnants of her shoes at the offender.

Astoria's face grew as red as the X that had been on her sister's, and she along with her friends stalked out of the room.

Neville bit his lip and frowned, hoping she wasn't off to find reinforcements –or worse— to tattle.

"Do you think Daphne's back yet?" He asked.

Pansy sneered. "Oh, yes, point me if you see her! But otherwise, do yourself a favour and—Don't. Mention. Her!"

Neville was glad he did not know even half of what the Slytherins had said to one another.

The Slytherin common room was, for all purposes, a dungeon. It was trying to be a very _homey_ dungeon though, with luxurious black and forest green leather couches everywhere and black gilded lamps that glowed warm yellow. The entire room was cast slightly green from the eerie lake water light streaming through the underwater windows.

A few other Slytherin students paid them no mind, save for one or two strange looks from the group at the study tables on the side. There was a large intricate set up of three simultaneous Exploding Snap games that littered the shiny dark wood surfaces. It was odd but, the ratio between females and males in Slytherin somehow seemed skewed. But it made sense in some way. A lot of families could have sent their boys to Durmstrang as it was a popular choice after the war.

If anything, being around so many Slytherin girls was more terrifying.

He moved forward to place Pansy on one of the sofas but she flicked him in the ear.

"_That_ way." Pansy pointed out what could only be the access to the dormitories, very obviously framed by its heavy iron-barred door that was meant to be dropped from its vertical placement overtop the entranceway. The bars were covered in tapestries that depicted famous (or infamous) Slytherins in action.

Neville recognized Merlin on a faded silver tapestry as he carried Pansy, giving a wide berth to an ancient high-backed chair with a silver skull motif.

The staircase coiled downwards with intricately designed banisters and balance beams all in the shapes of serpents. There were grand pedestals on either side that were a bit terrifying, covered in snakes with blunt heads and smooth bodies rising out of a mass bubbles or coins, he couldn't be sure.

Just then, Pansy's wand flung out and from the tip shot a freezing spell he didn't recognize. The staircase groaned and creaked like a giant was using the steps before Neville could even think to go down them. The spell only completed once the stairs glittered and cracked with frost and frozen water, creating a beautiful frosty platform fit for an ice princess.

At his quizzical expression Pansy stuffed her wand back and explained.

"A little trick that has been passed down the ages… Count yourself lucky! If I didn't know it you'd be roasted to moment your foot touched the steps."

Neville gaped, looking down the steps with fresh anxiety. On further inspection the serpents that made up the ornate banisters were Ashwinders, snakes born of fire, writhing atop a mass of eggs.

A couple of girls appeared at the bottom of the stairs and looked confused before spotting them at the top. Vexation overcame the taller of the two and she brandished her wand.

"Parkinson! What the bloody hell's going on!"

"You have _eyes._" Pansy shouted back.

"Cancel the spell!"

"Er," Neville was feeling like that tree again... "I'm just going to put you on the sofas."

"Neville, be quiet. And the only way that spell ends is by melting. Honestly."

The tall girl sneered. "I wouldn't know! Because I don't let boys come down to _my _Chamber of Secr—"

"I knew we should have gone to the Infirmary." Neville said weakly though no one paid him any mind.

"This whole landing is going to get flooded now. Everyone's going to know a boy was down here!"

Neville wanted badly to point out he wasn't there yet and he wouldn't be staying but at that one moment, he intrinsically understood why they separated and sorted the students every year. In Slytherin, he'd have been eaten alive.

"Filch is going to pop a vein because of this! Bloody hell, and he used to be so nice…"

"Oh come on!" The mousy haired friend complained. "This is _archaic! _Everyone just uses the potions cupboard!"

"How do _you _know that!" The tall one gasped, offended, but the mousy one ignored her.

"Take the party back outside! Or, the back of the Quidditch pitch. I hear that's where all the _Gryffindors_ go… "

"Shove it!" Pansy shouted, not seeming embarrassed at all, whereas Neville's stomach did messy summersaults. He didn't want to give the impression he was in their house for some sort of…_ liaison_. His face flamed.

"I'm just taking her to lie down."

The two girls each raised an eyebrow in a mirror-like illusion.

Neville coughed wildly. "I mean, her ankle is—and she has no shoes—"

"Stop talking, Neville." Pansy ordered. "And perhaps do a snowshoe charm for the little prats. Since you're so nice and all…"

Neville gratefully did what he was told and the girls dropped large icicles they'd used as ice picks on his feet as they passed. Still, he stood there holding Pansy tightly, frightened to focus on anything except the scent of her hair and the strain on his muscles after carrying her for so long.

He swallowed, remembering the sensible solid oak sidings and banisters with slight gold etchings and large sprawling tapestries of red and gold.

"I don't think we have anything like this in Gryffindor."

But the thought struck him that he'd never even tried entering the Gryffindor girls' dorms before. Never even thought about it.

Pansy shrugged and sounded dead amused.

"Salazar Slytherin prided in the pure."

"Er," Impure thoughts immediately sprung unbidden in Neville's mind. He shook his head, mouth dry, making his words crack like he was a young thirteen year old again.

"Did you ac-actually… _want_ me to carry you down there?"

Pansy tilted her head with a squinted look that he should have been able to read, if it weren't for a damned familiar voice which said, slowly:

"So…No one in seven centuries, eh?"

* * *

><p>Neville watched in a sort of petrified state of horror as Harry Potter and Draco Malfoy appeared at the edge of the stairs leading up from the boy's dormitory. As the two pairs stood there on the landing, Neville truly understood his little space in the universe would always, forever, be infested with irony.<p>

He just didn't know if that was worse than bad luck.

"_Potter?_" Pansy screeched, bristling in his arms like a cat trying to escape his hold.

"Seven centuries is a clever little lie. Is it like some sort of pick-up line?" Harry was looking at Malfoy, "To appear mysterious and charming?"

Malfoy ignored Harry in favour of squinting. "Longbottom, are you wearing _lipstick?_"

Neville hastily put Pansy down, feeling like he'd been caught plucking petals off flowers by Professor Sprout herself. He hastily wiped his mouth.

Pansy didn't gawk for long and she stalked forward on perfectly fine bare feet. Considering how often she wore heels, it was slightly amusing to see her flatfooted stature which gave the illusion of cuteness.

"Draco! Don't tell me you let _him_ in here!"

Of course, that nonsensical thought floated away as soon as she opened her mouth.

"Nonsense." Malfoy smiled with the palpable unease, but still he laughed. "Word on the street is Potter's had a bit of Slytherin in him."

Pansy's mouth twisted in a way Neville recognized. She was itching to tear into that questionable little tidbit.

"Don't even think it, Pansy! And as much as it pained me to do so, _yes_, I showed him in."

"Well you can show him back out!"

Harry just rolled his eyes. "Why do I get special treatment?"

"Because I don't _like_ you, Potter!"

"Oh yeah? Then that must mean you really _do_ like Neville."

Pansy's face went completely red with fury. Neville had to hand it to Harry. There wasn't something much worse for a Slytherin than making them face their own mushy feelings. He was sure of it.

Neville frowned and took in the glaringly obvious, as there was no way _not _to notice, but somehow no one has said a word about it.

Malfoy looked _terrible._

His usually carefully combed platinum hair hung in limp strands, some falling into his eyes which were rimmed with red and purple smudged skin. He could have sworn Malfoy had been wearing that same robe the day before, remembered clearly seeing him drape it over the back of his chair as he pushed it in to practice field survey charms with Neville in class. Malfoy never wore the same robe twice in a row.

Ignoring Pansy's soon to be guaranteed indignation, Neville asked, "Draco? Are you all right?"

"Hm?" Malfoy drawled distractedly, "and just where do you think you're going, Longbottom? What's the reason you're lollygagging about in our house?"

"Er— her ankle—"

And then just as quick as a snitch, Malfoy was smirking.

"She's been making you cart her everywhere? Watch out, Longbottom. Pansy's perfect at Episky! She'd have you carry her big behind all the way to the girl's chambers if she thought she could, and you'd never survive the staircase."

Pansy looked apoplectic. "And looks like _you'd_ let the Chosen One gallivant all over Slytherin!"

Neville surreptitiously rubbed the sore back of his neck, knowing the two would bicker until stopped. Greengrass confusions he could ignore. Malfoy, on the other hand, was a decent RATS partner. Neville severely hoped he hadn't been wrong about Malfoy and Pansy's friendship too.

He took a deep breath and said loudly: "Peace!"

Neville looked at both of them, Pansy and Malfoy glaring at him in shock, and continued, "You don't have to talk to each other that way. You _are_ friends, aren't you?"

Pansy rolled her eyes. "What else?"

Malfoy snorted.

Harry raked an agitated hand through his hair. "For your information, I was just giving him a lesson he _asked for_."

Neville's eyebrows rose in shock at that.

"_Patronus_ Charm lesson." Malfoy explained graciously fast but had a look about him like he was pretending to be in good spirits, face still ashen and skin sallow around the eyes.

"He's awful." Harry supplied.

"Why can't you practice in, oh, I don't know— the _Charms practice rooms?_" Pansy bared her teeth in annoyance, a perfect reflection of the expression on Harry Potter's face.

"Those were his conditions." Malfoy hissed. "Leave it, Pansy. I need this."

The desperation was plain as day in Malfoy's face and posture with that request. Neville felt a stab of guilt. He hadn't even tried to help.

There wasn't much sympathy in Harry's next words, when he said, "Don't be surprised if you don't get the charm to work, Malfoy. Shacklebolt told me that no Death Eater ever could."

Malfoy's face went completely white as if a vampire had drained him dry.

Harry snorted. "Let's go Nev. I'm done here."

"Good riddance." Malfoy and Pansy both snarled under their breaths at once, wearing his and her matching scowls.

Harry grabbed Neville by the arm to drag him back into the common room. They spotted the entrance, and Harry held the door open for an oddly long time, glaring back into the room until an errant Exploding Snap card near their feet crackled and popped.

On their way back to Gryffindor Tower, Neville saw Filch running angrily with a large dirty mop.

* * *

><p>Harry, Ron, and Hermione were tight-lipped all the next week as the end of March's spring washed in and warmed the castle all around them. It was sunny more of the time now, if not rainy just as much, but Neville loved this time of year.<p>

It was when all the best plants bloomed.

Neville smiled contentedly to himself as he awoke in his bed, sunny rays brushing through a crack in the bed curtains to tickle over his eyelids until they opened.

"—And you're _certain_ you didn't find or see anything?"

Neville frowned, not moving. That was Hermione's voice masked in an urgent whisper.

"No!" Harry hissed back. "I already told you. Besides, it's not like I _could_ snoop, what with having to teach Malfoy. Poor git's never going to get that charm— That's why I gave _you_ the Invisibility cloak!"

Neville pressed his lips into a thin line, trying to make sense of the harried conversation he was overhearing.

There was some rustling and the sound of a trunk clanking shut. Ron spoke next, "It was a bit hard to search when Hermione got iced trying to get into the dorms!"

"Yeah, I still don't know about that," Harry sounded annoyed. "You two had to spend most of the time under the cloak 'warming up,' huh?"

Hermione's next words were embarrassed.

"It's a safety measure against the opposite sex going into the dormitories! I tried a protection spell and hot air charm beforehand, but some magic is too ancient to contend with using just modern day means…Anyway, see? There's no proof. So you can stop obsessing over Malfoy having some nefarious plan for broken mirrors—"

Neville sat up like lightning when the front door opened and he heard Dean's jovial tone.

"Morning! Oh—Hi, Hermione. Neville up yet?"

Neville pushed his curtains back with a small smile of greeting. "Morning, Dean. I'll be ready in a few."

Sitting on Ron's bed were the guiltiest three expressions he'd ever seen. Hermione nodded primly and with a tight smile, excused herself. Naturally, Harry and Ron fiddled and tried not to look secretive while appearing completely suspicious.

Neville bit the inside of his cheek, realizing Pansy had been _right._

Out the corner of his eye, Neville watched as Harry kicked his trunk back into place and Ron fruitlessly dug around the bedskirts to find that intro textbook to Occlumency they would need these next few weeks.

Dean swung a satchel atop his own bed to shove books and parchment into it as the two other Auror students slammed out the door.

"Been twitchy lately, haven't they?" Dean said offhandedly in reference to Harry and Ron. "Breakfast is almost over though, so tomorrow you'd better get down there fast. 'Cause I swear, Pansy has been glaring at the Gryffindor table for long enough! Think it's started to give the younger crowd the creeps."

Neville was thinking of those two kisses like he did every morning (and any free moment). He thought about that day so frequently that it seemed like it had happened just the day before. And when he wasn't thinking about that date and kissing Pansy Parkinson, he was thinking about how they hadn't gotten a proper chance together yet, and about how now, Pansy stared at him all the time—like he was a _stranger._

To him, the next step was obvious, if not scary as hell. It wasn't strange at all. Unless there was some sort of hidden step to becoming boyfriend and girlfriend that he didn't know about.

But maybe Pansy was just starting to figure it all out.

"Her glare frightens even me." Neville chuckled, scratching his dishevelled hair.

Dean rolled his eyes and laughed out loud.

"_Even you._ Yeah, sure. I get it, big bad snake slayer! You love it."

Neville grinned, embarrassed and knowing he looked foolishly happy but didn't care.

"_Maybe _I love it."

_Her._

* * *

><p>"—And remember, close your minds! That's all for today, gents. Dismissed."<p>

The perfect opportunity to catch Pansy fell directly into Neville's lap when she showed up after the last lesson of the day outside Proudfoot's classroom.

Once the Professor had followed that large round nose out the door, Neville caught sight of her loitering just outside the doorway. Iridescent pink high heels were on her poised feet as she leant against the far wall.

The Slytherin girl cocked her head and smirked, watching him.

The side of Neville's mouth crooked up in an indulgent, fond smile. She was so _habitual_ for someone who called herself mysterious.

He waved from his work-scattered desk.

Ron and Harry clomped out the door, blocking his view for just a moment and then Malfoy followed quickly behind the duo.

Neville waved his wand and tried thinking_ 'Pack!'_

All the parchments and quills on the desk jumbled themselves up into a wad before ramming themselves into patiently waiting bag. He'd be unwrinkling those notes for a few hours, but it was worth it to get out of the classroom fast.

The only problem with perfection was that it lasted for an instant.

Standing in the doorway, Neville's good mood slumped in time with his shoulders, causing his book bag to spill its contents all over the floor in an awkwardly-timed mess.

Pansy and Malfoy were further down the hall and in the thick of a conversation getting louder by the minute.

It looked as though Harry and Ron had gone on, for he didn't see them anywhere. Which was odd, really, considering how they were suspicious of Malfoy and no one spilt secrets better than someone fighting with their best friend, or ex, or betrothed or whatever Pansy and Malfoy were to each other.

The blond Slytherin had his hands tightly crossed in front of him and then they were fists and then they were awkwardly shoved into pockets. Pansy looked hard-faced with determination, nostrils flared in an angry expression.

Neville stooped clumsily, kneeling on the stone floor to collect the scattered school supplies.

Pansy's voice suddenly erupted, loud in the empty corridor. "You _never even_ _asked_ what I think! You know what that tells me? That you don't even care!"

"I do!" Malfoy said, looking pinched as if that hook-behind-the-navel feeling of Apparation had caught him and whatever was pulling on the other side wouldn't let go.

"Just because a guy doesn't ask questions doesn't mean tha—"

He was cut off by Pansy angrily jabbing him with her wand.

"Pans'! _Don't _turn this into another argument. I told you nothing can change."

"Would you want it to change, if it could?"

Malfoy just shrugged weakly, looking down the point of his nose at some place in the distance unknown.

Neville's heart nearly broke at the sad almost defeated expression that overcame Pansy's features. She shook her head and the hard-faced look was back.

"I suppose I expected that. I just wish you'd told—"

"So what do you think?" Malfoy interrupted.

And Neville tried to be stealthy, but he didn't like eavesdropping, and the position was as awkward as a house elf with its head in the oven, just sitting on the floor staring like a gormless fool. But the Slytherins didn't pay him any mind, and Pansy watched Draco Malfoy for one long piercing moment before she said:

"If we were meant to keep kissing then we wouldn't have stopped."

Malfoy's chin was caught in that one precarious moment before it dropped in the way only begrudging acceptance could.

Pansy poked him in the chest with her wand. "I'm still going to hex Tori whenever I feel like it."

Malfoy's lip twitched up at that. "Don't stop on my account. I'm chuffed at the idea of you protecting me."

Pansy snorted. "Please. She's just been the littlest bitch because your mother switched up the marriage contracts. I don't play well with other bitches—You think I'm the type to protect someone?"

"Whether you like it or not Pans', you're dying to be that type."

Neville vaguely thought _'Pack!'_ and left the corridor before Pansy and Malfoy could break away from each other.

Because they eventually would—break away from each other, that is.

And it wasn't Neville's job to interfere. However, there was something else entirely that always needed fixing.

* * *

><p>Neville swirled a piece of broken mirror in a circle on the laid out parchment. The cloying scent of plum blossoms and freesia was faint now, dull like the greying paper it clung to. He could barely make out the answers to each Potions question that used to fill the parchment space. Simple words like Asphodel had become nonsensical and yet subconsciously damning, masquerading as the word Amortentia instead.<p>

When Pansy worked on the mirror, she couldn't see herself.

It was a sickening feeling, an ill sight to see. He remembered it like a hazy nightmare that didn't seem real now, so many years later.

Was it strange to stare into the mirror he held now, and think about how, even though he was looking for Pansy, he could only see himself? That it was like he was looking at her but seeing himself? Did that make any sense? Probably not. His mind was a bit of a mess, ever since he'd heard Pansy arguing with Malfoy.

'_If we were meant to keep kissing then we wouldn't have stopped.'_

Neville found a match and put it together, feeling frustrated for no reason, tumbling spinning feelings filling his chest.

He saw his reflection in the mirror shards staring back at him with those stressed blue eyes. Neville watched it closely, entranced by his miniature likeness, wondering why he never bothered to look before.

Well, actually he needn't wonder. Neville knew he didn't like to dwell on the things going on inside of his mind.

He _knew _what he knew, deep in the neatly organized secret garden of his thoughts. Every patch of emotion and ideas pruned and clipped into manageable little plots of ground he could wander.

When he was younger they would grow wild and insatiable, overrunning him with guilt and fear and anger that stemmed from the seed Bellatrix Lestrange's wand hand planted there sure as the spell it had burned through the minds of his parents.

But like the seed that had grown and fizzled away into gruelling acceptance, Neville had grown and bloomed into a more compartmental mind. It could be the reason why he could tell the Room of Requirement exactly the right place needed. It could be the reason why he was so proficient at Occlumency now. Proudfoot said trying to penetrate his defensives was like trying to escape the thin snaking vines of Devil's Snare. Even Malfoy said he was strong, who'd learnt it from his bloody aunt, rest in peace.

The image of himself in the piece of mirror stared back at him like a static image until its eyes flicked to the side and Neville followed suit, watching as Pansy walked into his hiding place in Greenhouse three. He resolutely stared down at the puzzle, determined frown etched in place. The stool beneath his bottom felt hard and cold and very real all of a sudden.

Pansy stuck her chin over his shoulder and there was something terribly wonderful in the way she snickered into his ear saying, "Found you."

Neville couldn't help but smile. "So you did, Pansy. How'd you do it?"

"Please," Pansy rolled those hazel eyes with the charcoal black eyelashes. "You're the biggest geek I know. It was either the library or here. Besides, it's spring."

She scrunched her nose and was obviously lowering her expectations of his intelligence with that one withering pout of her mouth. Neville sniffed, suddenly feeling a rather mushy sensation collect somewhere behind his sinus. His head got clogged with thick love for the fact that she somehow impossibly _understood_.

"There's Hermione." He said in a voice that came out stupidly high pitched, keeping up the rapport.

And Pansy just raised that one eyebrow. "Well I don't really _know_ her."

"And there's Luna."

"Swotty Ravenclaw type. Honestly, Neville, next you'll try name-dropping a nerdy Hufflepuff girl. All you're doing is making me look the _best_—"

He silenced her with a kiss. The stool fell over into a heap of burlap sacks left over from the winter, and dust kicked up over their feet. Neville held Pansy by the elbows, gently, and their eyes were open but it didn't matter because it still felt just as good as he thought it would. Only better, because he'd finally gotten the courage to do it himself.

Pansy made a sort of amused sound and closed her eyes, pressing into him and adding that wonderful blissful bit of pressure before he remembered he had to open his mouth. But she leaned back anyway, and that amusement had become clear in those eyes.

Pansy's breath ghosted across his lips like the warm smoke of an addictive substance. Her bangs were parted just a little and she was half-smiling or half-smirking, at this point it had become pretty much the same thing.

"I love you." He blurted.

There was an infinitely long moment of pause.

"You're a liar." Pansy said flatly, though with an open grin.

"Well, er—" He felt mortified, rooted to the spot. Where had _that _come from?

"You are _such_ a liar!" Pansy crowed, now sounding very amused. "You _never_ spied on me for your Poundfoot essay. You couldn't have. You didn't even try to know any of my awful secrets. So what, think I'm horrible but you're too nice to say differently? Or _worse_," She gasped. "You think I'm actually nice deep down too!"

"I don't." Neville replied, stress making his hands clench around her elbows. "I don't stay up all night thinking about if you're lying to me. I'm not paranoid! Pansy, I _know _you_._"

"Do you?" She asked in a watery sort of tone. She frowned and _looked_ at him. Really, honestly, _looked_ at him. "You've never even asked."

_Never even asked._

"I don't need to." He said slowly, not caring if she thought he was crazy or stupid or in love or all three.

"So now you think you're better than me?" Pansy's voice went shrill and she broke away from him.

"No!" Neville felt torn. "Would you have told me if I asked?"

"Ohh I'm Neville Longbottom!" Pansy blew up her cheeks and began to stomp around in the most awful impersonation to date.

"I'm becoming an Auror, that's a real fine job because I can help people and fight evil whilst getting glory and gold!"

"Pansy!"

She stomped her way over to the counters and began exploding the potted plants with her wand.

"And you know what? When I get into the program I'll be the first to sign up to raid the homes of all the big bad Slytherins who didn't help me in the war!— Oh, sorry, I meant third. No one could outrun Potter and Weaselby in that!"

Was that really what she thought? Neville's mouth became a tight line, forehead wrinkling.

Pansy's voice went up and down like a slippery slide, her wand waving at every adjective.

"And oh, I know! I'll pawn Pansy off on weedy little Ackerley when I know she hates swotty types, because I'm so _stupid_ and, and—"

Neville stared in quiet disbelief.

"All my friends are so perfect and great! You should love them Pansy, why don't you love them? If you did come along with us then we could all be a perfectly hideous textbook example of why _you and I_ _shouldn't be_—We. Shouldn't—" Her hands went up in the air, mouth screwed up to stopper her words.

"You don't have to love them."

"Well I _don't_, Neville! I don't! And even you can't change that. You're telling me you lov—" It was like the very word choked her with anger. "_WHY_ don't you just stick with _them?"_

Pansy's tirade came to a halt with her nearly face was red and blotchy and wholly unattractive, but Neville had been unattractive before. Things like that weren't anyone's fault but luck.

He surged forward and held her tight by the shoulders, shook her in his sweaty palms.

"Because I'm here with_ you!"_

Pansy stared, wide-eyed.

Neville swallowed thickly and his next words came out in a murmur, "I've been trying to figure you out, I have, but it's always been more important to help you. I don't need to know all your business. I don't need to _spy._"

He grimaced, acute embarrassment at the confession slicing through his chest. "I don't understand you half the time, but I _know_ you. And I don't think you really care about what other people think! I think you—you're trying to protect me from, I don't know, making a mistake?"

Pansy was still staring, eyes glassy and lashes clumped like that of a doll.

Neville shook his head. "I never felt this way about anyone before. So maybe I'm wrong, maybe other people would think it's a mistake but… who cares?"

"You're an idiot." Pansy said through silent tears.

And Neville frowned, so determined to get this right. "I'm lucky to be with you, Pansy."

Pansy was a blubbering mess, tears running down her face and framing her nose. He relaxed his hold on her then she closed the distance and their face-off became a tight hug. Her head fit under his chin and it was the worst time to notice, but she'd bumped him in the chin on purpose and his toe was going to go numb if she kept standing on it like that. It was perfect.

He felt Pansy's nails digging into his back and Neville buried his nose in her hair as he mumbled, "So you want to tell me something different?"

Pansy sniffed. "I flooded the girls' staircase on purpose. I wanted everyone to think we'd gone to have a good time."

Flummoxed, he asked, "Why?"

"I might have wanted Daphne to think that. She fancies the hell out of you. Bitch." Pansy added unnecessarily.

"All right." Neville hadn't seen that coming at all. "I don't like her."

"Of course you don't." Pansy's imperious tone was slowly building back, stronger than ever. "You love _me._"

Oh, Merlin. His embarrassment could kill him on the spot. She had ammunition to last a lifetime.

"And what about Malfoy?" The question was laced with a small amount of dread.

"Draco?" She raised one eyebrow, he could feel it against his neck. "Astoria's got her claws in him now, ever since their mums rewrote the marriage contract. Apparently girls who try to sell out Harry Potter are on Mrs. Malfoy's rotten list."

It was a good thing Neville had no such list. "You can do some pretty mean things." He said, agreeing.

"I know." She said quietly, unapologetically, but with absolute understanding.

The pieces of mirror on the tabletop glittered in the low light, and they looked beautiful, like her, because it was so fragmented—all over the place— but he could see the big picture.

Pansy took a step back and the heel to one of her shoes snapped off.

They stared at it.

Pansy swiped at her face with the back of one hand and her words came with that familiar lovable snark.

"Bad luck, huh?"

Neville smiled, "For seven years."

* * *

><p>TBC... The next chapter will be the last (I'm hoping) otherwise it might be split in two. But I want to thank you so much, everyone who has reviewed and checked out this story!<p> 


	13. Chapter 13

**SEVEN YEARS BAD LUCK**

* * *

><p><strong>Chapter 13 ~ In Search of a Little More Reflection~<strong>

* * *

><p>So as it turned out, the best way to talk to a girl you fancy is to make a complete arse of yourself by telling her the truth.<p>

Just like how her nose scrunched up to try and hide her fondness for unicorns, even hard-faced hard-to-impress Pansy wasn't impervious to use of the L-word. Even if she teased you about it all the time.

And it was really too bad that teasing was a favourite pastime of all Slytherins,_ everywhere_.

"This is never going to sink in." Malcolm Baddock complained loudly when Neville came to pick Pansy up by the hidden doorway one morning.

"Come along, Neville." Pansy ignored the observations and tugged harder on Neville's hand to lead them through the lines of Slytherin students loitering the dungeon hallways.

"He's always here now!" A tall weedy boy sneered.

"Shut it, Pritchard!"

It wasn't that he _liked _the dungeons, more like Neville was determined to be the most well-mannered boyfriend he could be possibly be.

Not that he'd ever tried to be anything but nice to Pansy but it was that much more important to be proper now that she'd acknowledged him. To do anything less would be like backing down from what he'd said in Greenhouse three.

There wasn't anything worse than saying you loved someone (someone who let you see them cry) and then not doing your damndest to show it.

It seemed likely that he would be the one spewing copious amounts of sap.

Ever since that day, Neville thought earnestly to himself that he wasn't doing half a bad job at bumbling through the new scary experience of _dating _Pansy Parkinson. So like a ritual, Neville woke up early enough to walk Pansy to breakfast every morning, and at the end of class hours she met him outside the RATS classroom so he could walk her back to Slytherin. Of course, she made him wait like an idiot on both accounts but Neville didn't mind.

When they could spare the time they worked on the mirror but NEWTS were closing in and so their time together did not deviate from Neville studying whilst Pansy kicked him in shins. He was frequently shut up in the practice rooms with the rest of the Remedial Aurors in-training these days and wondered if she thought about him when she tended to her end-of-year project in the Greenhouses or whilst serving detention for breaking all those young potted sprouts.

For all the things that had changed with Neville's confession, Pansy never did anything as embarrassing as saying she loved him too. That would have only made sense if she'd suddenly revealed herself as a Polyjuice pod person.

No, Pansy didn't do anything like that; didn't say anything about her own feelings at all. Neville knew then that any simpering she'd ever done on behalf of boys wasn't sincere. It made sense in a kind of anticlimactic way, that her smirk and disdain would always be the same, and her bad luck hadn't gotten any better or worse.

She was the same old Pansy, sassy and cool and just a tad mysterious, as if when she listened to her heart she'd hear a kind of fuzzy static sound resonating from where any mushy girlish glee might have been. One couldn't expect someone to make much sense out of white noise. After all, who was Pansy without that grudgingly wide barrier between what she truly liked and what she truly didn't?

He knew she wasn't tuned in yet, and that was _okay _because_ he _was listening.

To the little things.

Like how she held his hand or arm on every walk to and from Slytherin house. Like how she never ever pushed him away, even when there were teachers around. In fact, _she_ was the one who'd gotten a reprimand, from Professor Sprout no less! (To be fair, Neville had tried to tell Pansy that making suggestive comments about _Tentacula_ would get her in trouble one of these days.)

He listened when she'd laughed about Stewart Ackerley's longing sighs across the hall and when she sent a Howler to Neville at breakfast announcing to the entire school that the rumour about _'Longbottom, the sword, the snake and the whore' _was true.

He'd had to fight off nosey and flabbergasted students (they gossiped way too much) for days with a red face and had to avoid his close friends' amused faces for just as long.

Neville could never be mad at her though. In her own way she'd somehow made it official, and Neville had never been more sorely glad that his friends had at least seen it coming, even if they hadn't exactly expected him to pull anyone, ever, let alone the notorious _Pansy_ _Parkinson._

Neville didn't really believe it himself.

Maybe she'd pulled _him_.

In any case, he privately knew Pansy did a lot of things to piss off Daphne and Astoria Greengrass too. It was pretty obvious. She simultaneously used him as some sort of Slytherin repellent when she wanted to get away from her housemates, and as a Gryffindor poster boy excuse to get away with being nasty to students she just didn't like.

Apparently, to some people, dating a war hero was a good enough reason to excuse any bad behaviour.

He didn't like it, but he understood why Pansy allowed it to continue. Any means to achieve their ends, wasn't it?

In reality, Pansy Parkinson hadn't changed much at all.

But Neville had.

They were two utterly different people, but everything Pansy said or did didn't have to be _good_ for it to be enough to make him happy. It was all enough. There was more than enough of her to know everything he needed to know.

In short?

Neville ending up walking a _lot_ of stairs and she was worth every step.

"I'll see you after classes today, right?" He asked.

"Don't hold your breath. We're taking up assignments in Arithmancy... If I don't get an O on this one I'm sure there'll be words. Just what I need! Knowing my luck, a face-off with Vector."

Neville grinned. "I'm rooting for you."

She grinned back, "Gambler, are you? Don't go out on a limb."

"Nah, I'll never… leaf you."

Pansy crinkled her nose.

"Blergh!" Malfoy made a sour exasperated sound, appearing behind them. "Longbottom, please! Are you always this sappy?"

Malfoy was still out of sorts these days, still dull around the edges and looking like he hadn't slept a full night's sleep in quite a while. Either the final tests for RATS class were getting to Malfoy or he'd had too many run-ins with whatever he was practicing on to produce a _Patronus. _

Or, of course, it could have been something entirely different altogether, if Neville believed Malfoy was up to something, like Harry. He wasn't so sure he did.

"Pay no attention, Neville!" Pansy said primly, nose aloft and refusing to acknowledge Malfoy's wheedling.

"All the Slytherin boys are just jealous, you see, because the most eligible girl is now off the market."

Neville wanted to let out a chuckle at her bold-faced arrogance but just couldn't, not when she said something so laced with charm like that. He smiled and had a feeling Pansy's protective nature would always be somewhat double-edged.

"Pansy, you're the prettiest girl in Slytherin, naturally." Malfoy charmed right back.

"She's the prettiest in the whole school." Neville countered.

Malfoy sputtered, irritated, "You know, I changed my mind. I don't think I like this. She was my girl long before anyone ever knew _you_ existed, Longbottom."

Neville looked over to survey his expression, but Malfoy was smiling in a rueful manner. Neville knew that type of smile. He didn't care what Malfoy and Pansy might have been together before. Not anymore. He was just glad that, everything aside, the two were still great friends. That was the smile of a really great friend.

Slytherins. Who knew?

"Don't be stupid." Pansy had a wide smirk stretched across her lips. "I wasn't _his_. Draco was _mine._"

"Right!" Draco snorted. "Okay, think about this rationally Pansy, though I know you're raving mad so it will be difficult. You're holding hands – with _Longbottom!_"

"It's not the first time!"

"And yet, your blushing virgin always acts as though touched, for the very first time…"

Unfortunately, Pansy always laughed when there was a joke to be had at someone else's expense.

She and Malfoy snickered long and hard and Neville gave a strong shrug when he noticed a group of younger Gryffindors staring, unabashed in front of the Great Hall. Dennis Creevey grimaced, looking appalled as Neville led the two Slytherins into the Hall.

Pansy dropped his hand unceremoniously once they were standing beneath the opulent wooden doorway. It was strange. Neville watched her and Malfoy make their way to the green and silver breakfast table.

Malfoy always came to breakfast, but he'd begun skipping RATS classes. Auror Proudfoot wasn't happy with tardiness, let alone absence. But students did get crazy around this time of year.

Hermione's paranoid ramblings about her numerous flow charts over the biscuit dish were evidence enough.

Dean laughed and pounded Neville's shoulder when he took a seat. "I think I'm envious!"

Neville was still watching Pansy across the hall as he smiled, a smitten sort of smile, and asked, "Why's that?"

Ginny pointed at him with the end of her fork which had a large bit of egg speared on the end of it. "Because if she can let you get away with holding her hand in that plaid shirt and striped jumper set, she'd let you get away with _anything._"

"How lucky!" Luna said, sprinkling salt into her oatmeal next to Dean.

Neville quickly held a piece of toast up to his face (mostly to mask his horror, and his outfit).

Ron started to laugh hysterically and Hermione slapped her fiancé in the arm, making the egg on Ron's own fork fall off into his lap.

"It's so true!" Ron shouted, still half-laughing. "Hermione wouldn't even let me wear my lucky yellow vest to meet her parents!"

Hermione sighed.

"I don't know," Harry supplied sceptically, "I think it was the maroon trousers that sealed the deal…"

Ron gave a strangled yelp.

"Mum said those were brown!"

* * *

><p>"Boy. You there! Boy!"<p>

Neville cringed, edging away from the scratchy yet imperious voice as he passed through the Slytherin hallways. He'd just walked Pansy back to her house and after the numerous times he'd been through the dungeons, this was the first time the portrait of headmaster Fronsac had engaged him in private conversation.

Fronsac cleared his acrylic throat. "Stop there, boy. One of Gryffindor's, are you?"

"Yes, sir."

"Do you Gryffindor-types not tire of stairs?" Fronsac spit grouchily.

Neville didn't particularly like talking to portraits, but the fact that the old headmaster had even said something remotely sensible caused him to stop.

"Well, yeah-yes, sir." He said, looking around to make sure there wasn't some new Slytherin underclassmen prank underway.

"Then why on earth do you not use the shortcut?"

"What?"

"The password is _Libraries Liberate_."

And just like that, Fronsac's portrait swung forward on its creaky hinges to reveal a long narrow path which twisted a few hundred yards in, leaving it a mystery as to where it led.

"Normally, I would admit you with a riddle," The portrait's grumpy voice came from against the stone wall, "But even an old portrait can get sick of your stomping. Follow it and you shall find yourself closer to your goal."

Neville gaped, unsure, and stuck the glowing tip of his wand into the opening. Hogwarts' nooks and crannies could always lead to trouble; then again, he really hated stairs.

So of course Neville did what any self respecting teenage war hero would do.

He ventured forward.

And when he reached the other side of the tunnel, the magical moving staircases that lead up to Gryffindor lay in front of him.

Strange place, Hogwarts. Looked like there were more ties between rival houses than anyone knew.

* * *

><p>"Wait, you <em>knew?<em>" Neville tried terribly hard not to feel affronted at Pansy's madly amused face after he'd regaled her with a triumphant story about the shortcut behind Fronsac's portrait.

"You didn't?"

Neville groaned.

"Filch moved that ruddy painting to the dungeons in sixth year." Pansy smirked, voice melodious. "Poor Longbottom. Walking all those stairs for so long… Must have been some good exercise."

Neville found a boney elbow poking his side.

"Don't tell me this devious secrecy was about my waistline."

He would have been affronted, maybe, but Pansy's arm wrapped around his waist. It sent something in his chest fluttering like a Canary Cream that'd gone down the wrong way.

Pansy made a zipping motion over her lips. Too bad Luna and Ginny were laughing in her place.

"You walked right into that one." Ginny shrugged when his eyebrows shot up in a plea for help.

"He was walking up, not in." Luna commented and Ginny chuckled with the patience of someone who was used to Luna's literal sense of speech.

He watched the two girls gather their rucksacks to get up from the four-seater table they'd been sharing in the library.

Dinner would come soon, but Neville didn't want to follow. Not when he was right where he wanted to be. He lightly touched fingertips to his nose, trying to hide the embarrassing goofiness that threatened to take over his face. Pansy's head was bowed low over her assignment again, but the sparse scratches against parchment were a pretty good indicator that her head wasn't in it.

It was weird, but a good weird, a really, really good weird, to be able to spend time with Pansy and not be ostracized by his friends at the same time. If there had been a worse time to try and introduce a Slytherin into the close-knit group of friends, right after the war was about as bad as it could have gotten.

All it'd taken was the breaking of one mirror to put them together. Pansy really did have rotten luck.

But he was so glad. It hadn't occurred to him before, but the fact that they did not immediately condemn Pansy thawed an icy block of doubt in his mind that he hadn't known existed.

Things were all right. Everything was okay. It was so rare a thing, to feel happy and _normal_ that Neville could scarcely believe it.

"I have to go see Sprout about my final." Pansy said, suddenly surly.

"Now?" Neville replied eagerly, "I can go with you."

"As much as I'd like to see her face explode like a tomato, it's better if you stay away." Pansy grinned in a way that could only be described as evil. "She's still smarting about finding me slithering all over you the other day…"

Neville could literally feel his face turn bright red. "Um…"

Pansy snickered, gathering her belongings, but looked miffed at having to go out to the Greenhouses alone anyway. He helped her with a well-placed _Pack!_ and didn't care if she decided to call him a house elf.

She didn't.

They passed Malfoy in the halls but the blond stopped them, almost as if it were an afterthought.

"Longbottom, come with me. I need to pick your tiny brains for the lessons I've missed."

Neville frowned a bit. "Will that take a long? I just came from the library…"

Malfoy rolled his eyes. "Nonsense. We can't do _spellwork _with Pince around. You can wait for Pans' in Slytherin."

Neville blinked. "Er, sure…"

"Well, isn't that cryptic?" Pansy canted her hip to nudge Neville. "Be careful with him, he's delicate."

"Yes, Pansy." Neville and Malfoy said at once, and then they exchanged dismayed-outraged looks.

Pansy cackled in triumph before turning away. She'd only made it a few feet before Neville was rushing forward.

"Wait, wait, wait!"

"Please don't tell me you two are going to kiss goodbye." Malfoy deadpanned from the side. "Actually, no, do tell me so I can skewer my eyes with my wand first."

Neville ignored the jeer and schooled his features, holding out his left fist, palm up.

"I know pointy spells, Longbottom." Malfoy sounded amused but loathing at the same time from somewhere behind him. "It comes with the territory. It hurts looking so refined sometimes."

"We'll admire you later, Draco." Pansy did not look impressed, staring at Neville's outstretched fist. "What?"

He shook his head, unable to stop the smile that kept creeping up.

Pansy smirked, intrigued. "What have you got?"

Neville put a finger to his lips.

Pansy tried to grab his fist but Neville was quicker and before she knew it, he'd done a complicated looking wave of the hand that produced a perfectly formed purple flower.

Pansy stared and then slapped him on the arm. "How'd you do that? What spell?"

"Auror trade secret." Neville said in his best serious professional voice and then he carefully brushed Pansy's bangs, tucking the flower there behind her ear.

Pansy just shook her head smirking, but her painted fingernails touched the petals in a gentle graze before she turned on her heel and flounced away.

"Auror trade secrets include Muggle magic tricks?" Malfoy asked in a sort of patient but patronizing tone as he and Neville walked in the opposite direction.

Neville grinned. "They're very tricky, Muggles. Think my Gran would like it?"

Malfoy sighed as though he were a long-suffering victim of bad ideas.

* * *

><p>"All right, get in." Malfoy's bony hand was cold even through Neville's thick sweater as he shoved him in between the shoulder blades.<p>

Neville frowned to himself but went willingly, stepping into the foreboding den of Slytherin House. He had barely turned around to see the door seal closed before Malfoy's hand was clamped around his forearm and Neville was being dragged through the common room past sneering silent faces he'd begun to start recognizing.

"Uh, Draco, I said I'd help! No need to—"

"Shut it, Longbottom." Malfoy's voice was tense and low and Neville didn't really have a chance to argue before he was being pulled like the stubborn rusty end of a sleek runaway train. They went up the staircase, no archaic alarms or hexes frying off their faces as they entered the boys' dormitories. A roaring fire by the hearth brought warmth to the otherwise dark chambers.

Draco pushed Neville to sit on the trunk at the foot of a four-poster bed and then began pacing back and forth in quick jerking steps.

"Uh…" Neville bit his lip.

Draco stopped, spun on his heel, and pierced Neville with slit grey eyes of steel.

"Do you really love her?"

Neville froze on the spot, knowing a red flush was creeping up his neck. In contrast, Malfoy's icy grey eyes promised immolation, burning bright with some sort of emotion Neville couldn't identify. Jealousy? It didn't fit.

Neville squinted.

"Damn it! Longbottom!" Malfoy slammed one hand out, hard, against a cabinet lined against the wall which shuddered under the force. Neville stared, wide-eyed at the vibrating piece of furniture, vaguely wondering if that ugly cabinet was where Malfoy kept his practice boggart.

But it was really actually Malfoy doing the shaking.

"She told you that, huh." Neville muttered, nervous.

"Yes, she tells me other people's sordid secrets. Get over it. I'm being blunt. No sense in politeness when it's a rude question to begin with and all that rubbish, but just—really. Getting to the point here, you've never dated before. So how can you love _Pansy?_"

There was no point in asking how Malfoy knew; it wasn't exactly a huge secret that Neville Longbottom used to be a nobody. He turned the idea over in his mind, like the smooth feel of a rune stone in his hand.

He tried to answer but no words were forthcoming. It had been so simple to spill all is jumbled feelings to Pansy and know she'd understand, but to explain it to someone who couldn't understand was a daunting task.

It's just… Neville was not an open book.

He tried again, thinking of Harry and Ginny, Ron and Hermione, of Luna, thinking of Malfoy, thinking vaguely of himself and how the Auror training program was going to change his life forever.

"I guess you could say it was all the mirror's doing."

"So you're saying you _did _use that to pull her?" Malfoy shouldn't have looked impressed at such underhanded idea, but then again, that was the difference between them.

"No." Neville frowned. "I know what bad luck feels like, Draco. There's nothing good about it."

"Oh? What does it feel like?"

It was a little surprising that Pansy hadn't told him _that_ too.

Neville squinted, trying to uproot the ghost of that feeling.

"It was as if I wasn't whole. Like instead of the curse burdening me with bad fortune, it took something of mine away. The part that kept me from getting turned into canaries and falling off brooms and forgetting simple things."

He knew there was more to it than that, a more specific reason. He just didn't know how to say it.

"Like there was something missing." Malfoy said and then was quiet, too quiet, for a really long time as he rubbed his pale clammy hands together in rough motions. There was an odd sort of whispering sound, like that of a cloak waving in the fire's draft.

Malfoy smiled tightly. "But seeing as how you're missing your brains, it's difficult to believe in your comparison."

The insult smarted, just a touch, because Neville hadn't been expecting it, but just the tone of Malfoy's voice made it shaky at best. Neville could practically feel the nervousness radiate off him.

"Draco, are you all right?"

Then Malfoy asked, quite out of the blue, "Read any good books lately?"

"Hey, don't worry about it." Neville reassured. "If you think I'm part of Pansy's bad luck, well, maybe I am. But it doesn't last forever." His voice filled with determination. "We're going to find her reflection."

"It's that easy?" Draco replied, looking a bit lost.

"Most people find it right away. I mean," Neville gave a half grin, "It's kind of difficult to lose a piece of yourself."

"Not as difficult as you think." Malfoy muttered.

Neville could feel and uneasy chill creep up his spine at those words. He'd always thought fire cast eerie shadows, but there was one stretching all the way across the rug to touch their shoes.

Things weren't right.

He stood, "Draco. What's that supposed to mean?"

"Didn't know that bit, did you Longbottom?" Malfoy started to laugh, one breathlessly desperate sound that got carried away like a puff of smoke. "Losing a piece of your soul meant you were a step closer to being dead."

The chill in Neville's spine exploded.

"What are you saying?" He asked cautiously, edging closer, eyes widening as Draco reached into his robe pocket and slipped out a large mesmerizingly beautiful hand mirror.

"You'll help me, right?" Draco's voice was verging on hysteria as he spoke.

"We've got Aurors all over the bloody manor, and I can't even cast a _Patronus_ because I was a _Death Eater._ If I can't become an Auror then my whole family is going to go to shit. I have to do this." He stroked the mirror in dismay. "I break off a piece of my soul and live with bad luck. But I'll _live._ If I don't do this, then I'll get killed for sure. I'm already as good as dead. And the dead can't die!"

Draco cursed the mirror, pointed features pinched into fear and anger and desperation as his hand flew back to smash the mirror.

"_Protego!"_

Harry Potter threw off his invisibility cloak.

Neville had his wand pulled and a charm aimed for the hand mirror before he'd even registered it.

The cushion charm zinged by, missing its target. Harry dove forward, but Neville was already on the floor and caught it before it crashed.

Just then Ron and Hermione burst into the room.

"Harry!" They screamed and then just as quickly though full of confusion—"Neville?"

Malfoy fell to his knees, expression devastated. "Why did you…" He gasped, "Why'd you stop me?"

"Why'd you need a witness?" Harry shouted in reply, scowl firmly in place as he wrenched Malfoy up by the elbow.

"I," Malfoy looked down. "Thought Longbottom'd help make it work. He's up to his ears in Bad Luck."

Neville could only stare at his reflection, shocked and confused looking back at him. He blinked at the other Gryffindors.

"How'd you get past the freezing problem?" He asked, dazed, cradling the mirror in his hands.

Hermione looked contrite. "Pansy knows a spell."

Malfoy slumped onto his bed, defeated with Harry staring down at him with a solemn green gaze.

Neville twirled the mirror in his palm.

Of course that's when Pansy decided to waltz in, thunderous expression firmly in place. It was miraculous, really. She barely reached his shoulder in height, but he could easily imagine that she would fill any room she was in.

"What in blazes is going on?" She screeched.

"Oh, you know," Neville blurted before anyone could say anything, "we've just gone a little mad. From exams, you know!"

Pansy glared at the intruding Gryffindors.

"Er," Harry said unhelpfully. "Yeah, Neville saved the day."

Malfoy snorted, obviously putting on a brave face for Pansy. "Longbottom can't save a knut."

How to explain? That Malfoy'd found some information about the curse of Bad Luck. That losing your reflection makes it harder to die. Bad things would happen, but nothing that would ever kill you. A subtle effect, but enough for someone terrified of putting their life at risk for a job they so desperately needed.

Malfoy was afraid, so he'd wanted to find a way to help preserve it.

Slytherins are all about self preservation.

Maybe it was better to let the snakes sort themselves out.

Neville held up the mirror. "I'll just be leaving with this…"

Pansy stomped forward and tried to pluck it out of Neville's hands.

"Ow!" Neville winced; the handle had a delicate filigree pattern that wound around it which had broken and snagged on his skin. He watched as one thick drop of blood travelled down his palm from the cut.

"You're _bleeding_." Pansy gasped, ripping the hand held mirror, nicking him further.

"Ah! Pansy! That was sharp."

She ignored him, furiously examining the tarnished surface of the mirror.

"Hey, Pansy," He held out his hand. "Think you could fix this for me?"

Pansy looked furious beyond words. Her red lips trembled, eyes wide and then slitted and then wide again.

"If you're going to become an Auror you'd better learn it for your own damned self!"

Neville could see out the corner of his eye the other Gryffindors glaring at her, hovering over Malfoy suspiciously yet protective. They were probably thinking that surely Pansy knew how spiteful she sounded.

That was the thing about Slytherins. They said things like that no matter what they were actually feeling.

It was up to Neville to translate what she meant.

"I can do it." Hermione started forward, wand poised.

"Back off Granger!" Pansy shouted, claw-like hand clamping down onto his wrist. Neville yelped at the rough jab of her wand.

"_Episky!_"

"At least it wasn't a flock of mental birds…" Ron muttered.

* * *

><p>It made sense in the same way all Slytherins made sense.<p>

And that, of course, was in the most backward and unpredictable way possible.

Neville knew that many people were still suffering, after the war. It was no secret. They all had scars, every one of them. But he didn't pretend to understand just how many different ways to suffer existed. He supposed that was why no one had really noticed as one teenaged Death Eater's suffering went from plain feelings of guilt and powerlessness to irrepressible desperation.

Malfoy, who'd had his whole life rearranged into something unrecognizable, had tried to find a way out. His reputation tarnished like his arm; his relationships shattered. He'd seen his situation as worse than even Pansy's scrambled luck, and really, his _mind_ must have been a little scrambled itself, if he thought giving himself Bad Luck would help.

The real crap about it all was that no one except Harry Potter had seen it happening, and Draco Malfoy was the one who'd tried to make the change stop.

As if losing a piece of your soul to a broken mirror and the curse of Seven Years Bad Luck could have made anything stop.

Things were all right though, after that day. Pansy watched Draco with diamond-like precision; he was sharp and fragile, like glass, except she was the only who could see through him.

Well, her and Harry, anyway.

Strange thing, Hogwarts relationships. You could go your whole seven years without _knowing _someone, anyone, and then against all odds you got one more try.

Suddenly you got everything you required, in one glorious swoop. Neville thought he liked it better than the Room of Requirement.

Because once he stepped out of Hogwarts Pansy wasn't just going to disappear.

The previous year they'd all be in asymptote axis, skimming the final point. But it was real this time, and as the weeks went by the NEWTS and Auror entry tests came rushing up to meet them, like the hard ground after a very long fall.

And thank Merlin, Neville was going to Auror Headquarters for commencement of official training in a few months. He was going to become an Auror.

He was going to have great news to tell Gran— after he'd introduced her to Pansy, that is.

Amazing, charming Pansy Parkinson, she'd passed her exams too. When he'd opened his mouth to say something sappy, she'd kissed him in that special shade of lipstick and as she'd pulled back, she smirked and told him to shut up because he'd do anything just to make acorn-y pun.

Neville was stumped.

Now if that wasn't love, he'd never know what was.

* * *

><p>He'd read about it in the books; memorized as best he could the procedure instructions off leaflets McGonagall had passed out. He'd even had to listen to both Gran and Uncle Algie regale in numerous stories of the past (which he'd unfortunately heard all before), but Neville knew there were no rules or words or <em>anything<em> to describe the graduation ceremony of Hogwarts.

The feeling as he stood in the Great Hall for the last time as a student washed over him like the flickering of warm candlelight the first night he'd arrived, all those years ago. The memories sent shivers down his spine, but good shivers, like the soothing vibrations a touching song could send deep into the mind. The feeling kept singing and singing and naturally, the Sorting Hat wouldn't shut up.

He'd often wondered really, how anyone could have left Hogwarts without this final goodbye; this gentle touch upon the heart and soul. Like a father's fingers through one's hair. Like a mother's lips upon one's forehead. For many, this would be the kindest touch that they would ever have and would ever know.

From home, to Hogwarts, to war and then back to all three…

The act of graduation left so heavy of an impression that it sank in, creating an indentation which they would carry on their persons for the rest of their lives, like that of a bellybutton. A necessary hole, yearning to be filled up by all the things they were meant to do and all the dreams they were meant to live out or die trying.

It was no wonder why those who left Hogwarts returned. Maybe not everyone right now, but someday. One day.

Neville knew he would come back.

At the end of the night of feasts and speeches and tears and goodbyes, all the boys and girls shed their House colours and were ushered out under the sobering night sky. Hollowed, they followed in alphabetical lines of two down the pathway using only the stars and Hagrid's large lantern to find their way to the lake. In pairs they took to the boats in a mirror-image of their first year selves.

Neville Longbottom got into a boat with Luna Lovegood.

Pansy Parkinson got into one with Harry Potter.

The lake was dark, so dark that one couldn't see his own reflection, and so the students-no-longer were required to stare ahead into the darkness to the shore on the other side.

And perhaps it was part of some preordained fate – Bad Luck's will— that Pansy would be forced to spend the one reflective moment where they left Hogwarts behind for good with the Chosen One she'd tried to give away. He never did know what the two had said to each other, if they'd said anything at all. But in the years to come it would show that the short boat ride towards an era's end had catalyzed a new change.

Neville knew from that point onward, from the moment their newly graduated feet had touched the sandy wood of the docks on the other side of the lake and Hagrid proudly blew his nose into one tiny lacy handkerchief, the war had officially ended.

It was finally time to live.

* * *

><p>Next is the Epilogue which is the last…<p> 


	14. Epilogue

**SEVEN YEARS BAD LUCK**

* * *

><p><strong>Epilogue ~ The Magic of Seven Years Bad Luck~<strong>

* * *

><p><em>Neville Longbottom plus one.<em>

The curly gold letters mocked him for days. Not because he didn't know who to take; he knew exactly who he would love to have on his arm. And he wasn't even terrified of asking her. He knew for a fact that she would love to nose in on everyone's business (apparently wedding receptions were great for that sort of thing).

But there were going to be _Muggles._

A bunch of the boys from Auror Program had been enlisted for preparation of Ron and Hermione's big day, and they'd gone through clearance, combing through the venue with figurative fine tooth combs, making sure the proper spells could hold in place for the big day.

They'd cast a smorgasbord of charms to make it safe and meet the guidelines of the ministry's very long legislation on the matter. There were to be modified memory charms woven together with a stretched out _Fidelius_. Hermione, of course, had given out detailed instructions.

Neville rubbed his wrist. It still smarted from all the extra swishing and flicking.

The place was set all right. It was going to a brilliant wedding and the perfect way for his school friends to start their new life together.

It just happened to be the same place where his peculiar relationship with Pansy Parkinson was going to bite the dust.

* * *

><p>Ron and Hermione's wedding was going to be a disaster.<p>

Neville tapped his wand nervously against his knee. The boutique chair he sat upon was too small and too pink. He kept having to shift his weight on its tiny filigreed wood legs and at each movement the cushion let out a dainty puff of pink scented. In fact, the delicate shop smelled like old witches covered up with too much perfume.

Lace and sheer fabrics decorated the racks of pricey pastel coloured robes and baby's breath blossoms danced around the ceiling, sometimes dipping down to smack him on the head for not being cheerful enough. Neville had to swat at one particularly determined bushel to keep the tiny white sprouts at bay.

"Neville, stop dilly dallying and help me choose."

Neville groaned and the flowers attacked him anew.

Pansy crossed her arms, chin pointed up as she eyed him. Her dark bob of nearly black hair and red lips stood out in stark contrast what she wore. The bodice was made of delicate pale pink spider web-print lace that fit her torso like a glove which exploded into a skirt full of handsome large frills that dissolved from pale pink into deep fuchsia barely covering her knees.

"You look gorgeous." Neville said, a bit flummoxed and tongue-tied and blushing. "It's like a smaller, see-through version of your Yule Ball robes."

He could see her undergarments peaking through the sheer un-patterned bits of the lace. Didn't Pansy know people could_ see_ things?

"I don't trust you." Pansy replied, not missing a chance to continue shopping around with her hands combing through the racks. "But seeing as how I don't have a reflection I suppose it will have to do…"

"I worked on the mirror last night," Neville got up, knocking into three more bushels of baby's breath. The cushion coughed more perfume. "We can get takeaway. Work on it again tonight."

Pansy looked away. "Can't. Busy."

Neville's smile slumped. More and more often Pansy had been leaving the mirror in his possession not ever bothering to work on it with him. He wasn't sure if she had given up hope, but it was obvious she didn't want to talk about.

There was only one thing Neville knew was cert. Pansy Parkinson still had irrefutable bad luck the refusal to work on the mirror together meant she was slowly weeding Neville Longbottom out of her life.

"Here." Pansy thrust something into his chest that suspiciously looked like a purse made completely of frills. "Hold that."

"Er…"

"This selection is _ghastly_." Pansy made a point to speak loudly and the store's matron, a very blond very smiley witch dressed in a pink and yellow pinstripe suit blinked wildly in outrage from the front of the store.

"But I'm not walking out of here without _something_ frilly. Not enough people were frills. They are noble pieces of clothing architecture."

Neville privately disagreed as she flounced back into the change rooms to take off the dress she'd found for the wedding.

Still, didn't stop him from surreptitiously buying a matching jabot for himself with the rest of the things. It was a wedding anyway. Everyone wore ridiculous stuff. She'd love it. It seemed fitting to make her have as much fun as possible, because it was inevitable. Things were going to end soon.

He could feel it.

The stripey matron looked like she'd bitten into a lemon and was trying very hard to be happy about it as she rang up his purchase.

Pansy's voice echoed to the front.

"And Longbottom! Pick up some dandruff potion while you're at it. I don't know why you walk around like that."

"Oh, for Merlin's sake."

* * *

><p>The big day came, and as predicted, seeing him choked in a lacy jabot sent Pansy into thrilled cackling.<p>

"Neville," Pansy came up to him with wide eyes and she immediately grabbed his arm after milling about in the reception tent. Or he thought she'd grabbed him, the sleeves on his formal cloak were perhaps a bit too voluminous.

"There are _Muggles _everywhere." She whispered dramatically. "I think that old one there has a crush on me."

She pointed out a chipper man who looked to be a century old, sitting in a very odd chair with wheels.

"Really." Neville said, bemused. "Hermione's family is all Muggle. I know you'd never forget _that_."

"Yes, but are you sure they're _all_ pureblood Muggles? That one looks part-_automobile_." The way her tongue twisted around the foreign word charmed him to the core.

But Neville was determined to dig out her prejudices right away so they could get the inevitable falling out over with. The more he thought about it, the more he figured it was the perfect place for it too. Here he was surrounded by scores of his friends, and she was clinging to his arm like that time her hair got burnt and she was worried everyone would stare. Like she needed him.

If they parted ways now it wouldn't be as bad for him, right?

After a year of juggling Pansy, the Auror program, the mirror, and _life_, he couldn't really picture what would become of him without it all.

A sharp pain in his gut reminded him that he didn't want things to go badly for her either. But it was going to happen, he was sure of it.

"Yes, but how did they cut through all the red tape! I mean, just look!" Pansy gestured at the centrepieces which were charmed to spark and glow the happier the people sitting near them got. One old man had lit his beard on fire after laughing too hard.

"This doesn't seem _legal_…"

Prudence coming from her was actually a little bit charming, but she'd missed the bait. Or ignored it. She was amazing at feigning ignorance and yet pointing out people's flaws with amazing accuracy; it was why being his plus one was going to blow up in their faces.

He rubbed his nose with a thumb and pulled her along past the refreshments and a group of Muggles investigating the butterbeer taps.

"There was some Auror string pulling involved." He explained and left it at that wanting her to stew, to start voicing her distaste.

But when he chanced a glance at her again, Pansy seemed to have washed her hands of it, spotting something that made her grin in delight.

Oh boy.

Harry and Ginny were having a fight.

In plain sight.

"Why did you invite _him?_"

"He helped with the charms, Gin, _come on_. You would have—"

"_I'm_ supposed to be your plus one!" She hissed, face getting progressively redder underneath the freckles.

Harry made a frustrated gesture of rubbing hands in his hair, destroying any semblance of style. "You're a _bridesmaid. _You don't need to be a plus one!"

"That's not the point, Harry, you—"

Neville watched Draco Malfoy walk up to the pair, with drinks in each hand. These days Malfoy was one of the best wizards in their program. It paid to have a Slytherin in the ranks. He was cautious and cunning to such a point that no one paired with him ever came back with a scratch.

Sometimes a little fear worked wonders.

"Looks like this party finally picked up." Pansy batted thick eyelashes lavishly at Neville, upturned nose scrunching when her smile couldn't get any bigger.

Neville took a deep drink of his champagne, trying to drown his galloping heart as she weaved her way towards the other Slytherin, expecting Neville to catch up or wallow in her dust.

He should have brought Gran.

* * *

><p>He waded through the happy crowds endlessly. Pansy and Malfoy had ensconced themselves in a corner or something, because he hadn't caught sight of the sneaky duo for a while. So many people he hadn't spoken to ages were in attendance though, so Neville found himself being pulled in all directions, chatting until his voice started to get tired.<p>

"Neville, oh!" Hermione was radiant, all smiles and large hair weaved with blossoms. She threw her arms around him. He hadn't seen her look so happy in ages.

She grinned. "I'm glad I caught you! I have to introduce you to someone."

"Thank you." He smiled warmly. "It was the most beautiful wedding I've ever seen. Who am I meeting, family?"

"Hah!" Ron wheedled, sidling up to them with Harry in tow and champagne flutes in hand. "Don't listen to her mate, she has an evil plan."

"It's sweet." Hermione frowned.

"It's absolutely wrong." Ron, of course, disagreed.

Hermione gave him a warning look. "And pray tell, Ron Weasley?"

"Of course, Mrs. Weasley." Ron replied and Hermione looked momentarily chagrined and… besotted.

Harry began to cringe. Neville cringed inside. Outside, he merely gave a nervous little laugh and began drinking his new champagne flute a bit too fast.

Hermione waved to someone in the crowd and Hannah Abbot came up, shy smile curling her features.

"Hi Nev!" She said happily.

"Hannah," Neville greeted, patting her on the shoulder awkwardly as she came in for a one-armed hug. "Okay. Hey—er, hi!"

"You two dance!" Hermione announced looking smug and bright.

"Uh," Neville felt horrid. "I'm sorry. I'm here with Pansy." His voice went high pitched. "Pansy Parkinson? She's my plus one."

"Oh." Hannah replied awkwardly disappointed. "I saw her with Draco Malfoy for ages, so I, um…"

Hermione looked equally put out and Harry just rolled his eyes.

"Let's go then, Hannah, because this is my favourite song and these two've got to freshen up those hiding the house elves charms."

He grabbed her by the elbow and they made quick work of the dance floor. It was nice to see some things never changed. The Chosen One still couldn't dance.

Hermione had a contrite grateful expression as she watched Harry. Ron gave Neville a pathetically unhelpful look over her head.

"Sorry." She whispered to Neville. I thought she would be great for you." She confessed. "Hannah's sweet and down to earth and has always looked up to you."

Neville felt annoyed. Not because of Hannah and all her good traits, but because it was Hermione who'd discovered them and felt it prudent to share. He stubbornly had a private thought that most girls he knew looked up to him because they didn't wear unreasonably high heels.

"And I couldn't help but notice... that you and Pansy haven't so much as looked at each other all evening."

She looked so disheartened about it but Neville couldn't help but think she was pressing her luck. Just because Pansy humoured him by attending weddings with Muggles didn't mean Neville wanted someone to fill the gaps.

"What's this about?" He made sure to ask softly, so she didn't know he had already disagreed with whatever was coming.

"It's just…" She bit her lip and looked around suspiciously before saying.

"We told you it was a bad idea." Ron put in.

Hermione grimaced. "Look, I heard she doesn't have a job yet and she's been pretty much living off you. You know in school she always thought she was going to be the wife of some rich pureblood by now, living off his Gringotts account? But she's not and now she's trampling all over you—"

Neville jumped, eyes squinted and flinty. "I _am _pureblood, and do all right by myself, I'd like think."

Hermione's mouth pursed. "Do you think that before she broke that mirror, it was you in her plan?"

"Not everyone has a plan!" He exclaimed.

Not everyone went around planning to give up Harry Potter to the Dark Lord, just as how he didn't plan on giving her his heart.

"Oh come on Hermione," Ron was aggrieved, "You're just making a fuss because it's _your_ great uncle who's been drooling over her lacy bits all night—"

One sharp cut of the eyes from Hermione had her husband quickly downing the rest of his champagne to keep further damning words from flowing out.

"Oi, Nev!" Seamus waved coming up to them. He'd already downed a couple flutes of champagne from the looks of it and was all bright smiles next to Dean. "You'll like this one. It's about the hag, the healer, and the Mimbulus Mimbletonia—"

* * *

><p>Familiar notes trickled through the air and the Weird Sister's single from last year started playing through the <em>Sonorus<em> charms. Neville was poignantly reminded of bright early-spring sky, dangerously high heels and falling glitter. It was late, most party-goers slumped over their drinks at the various dinner tables. Only the foolishly determined and drunk still danced on.

"There you are!" Pansy said with flourish, flapping her hand in his face as she rushed to him from the cocktail bar. "I've been looking for you!"

"No you haven't," Neville replied, sort of amused. "You've been having a liaison with Draco Malfoy."

"Define_ liaison_." Pansy smirked, leaning on him and wrapping her arms around his middle. It was partly due to the fact she'd been dancing all night and her heels were atrociously tall. Something inside Neville melted.

"To be honest," He began stilted, feeling boorish for bringing it up but in needed to be said, "I figured you've just been hiding out, you know. Ridiculing anyone unfortunately dressed. Catching up on gossip… escaping the Muggles." He muttered the last bit.

Pansy raised one eyebrow. The fairylights that floated above created a kaleidoscope of colours on her new lace dress. "Are you expecting to have some kind of row?"

Neville swallowed, anxiety flooding his mouth with idiotic words. "People already think we are. Hermione even tried to set me up. At her own wedding!"

The side of Pansy's mouth curled and she sniffed, looking him up and down. "You're a sad excuse for a plus one."

His insides crumpled but Pansy didn't pause.

"Lucky for you I don't feel like fighting when I'm having so much fun. Also, my feet hurt and I'm slightly drunk."

"Really?" Neville felt a deep chasm of darkness open in his chest just thinking about how wrong he'd been about her. "I expected you to absolutely hate this night and never speak to me again."

To his utter horror Pansy didn't bother to ask him 'why' only started laughing at the top of her lungs.

"You're so stupid." She said between cackles. "I owe you a dance."

"What?" Neville grit out, stumped.

"Come!" She waved an imperious arm and dragged him back to their table. The tableskirts were a pale blue with matching covers on the cushy chairs. She grabbed someone's glass of red wine and downed it in one go.

"All right Longbottom." She rubbed her mouth with the back of her hand in one brutish swipe, smearing the shimmering lipstick that Neville remembered buying her in Hogsmeade. Had it really been a year?

"I'm as ready as I'll ever be. Let's do this."

"Er…" He backed away nervously, but Pansy advanced, teetering dangerously on heels as high as the Eiffel tower. "Pansy, I think you've—"

"Nev-ville!" She cried and caught him by the frills. "Be quiet. Don't talk, you ruin the atmosphere."

"Uuhh…"

She gave him that _look._ "It's slim pickings, though not surprising considering this is a tent full of _gingers_. If I don't do it with you then I'm going to have to do it with Mr. Toffee teeth over there."

She swung short black tresses with a gesture of her head and Neville caught sight of the old half muggle with wheels seated at the tables, smiling lavishly towards Pansy across the dance floor. He grinned and raised his glass, teeth all brown and stubby, and a scarily merry twinkle in his eye.

"Pansy," Neville gasped. "You didn't _hex_ him, did you?"

"Of course not." She scoffed, rubbing her nose into his collarbone, "Those are all natural."

Neville barely stopped before making a face. And then laughed because he'd almost made the face Pansy was making. Didn't she know that it was just plain rude?

Pansy grinned into the frilly folds of his dress shirt, laughs sprinkling across his chest like the fizzyness of a warm butterbeer on a really frosty night in Hogwarts greenhouse three.

He smiled at her fondly. "You _are_ a bit sloshed, aren't you?"

"So are you." She succeeded in pulling him onto the dance floor, long nails clawing deep into his sides to hold him in place.

"I know you can dance." She said into his ear and Neville gulped.

"Yea-yes, _but_—"

She clamped a hand on his arse and he yelped. "_Butt_ indeed." And she began snickering with madness. Neville felt about ready to croak.

"I want to dance!" Pansy announced loudly, throwing her free arm up in an imperious gesture as if to strike up the band.

Someone with an age-ripened voice from the tables crowed in delight, "Here, here, Posy! Save one for me!"

If anything, that spurred Neville to just get things over with. It had nothing to do with the number of flutes he'd drunk, or anything having to do with the hand on his bottom. After thirteen songs and three more champagne flutes, the inevitable occurred. Her shoe heels broke off and she forced him to hand over his so she could keep dancing.

Neville watched from his seat at the table, her broken shoes sitting in his lap and his throbbing socked feet propped up on the draped cushion of the chair he was saving. It felt rather nice actually, being able to save a lady while sitting down.

His head began to swim a bit and then it felt a lot like he wasn't sitting down at all.

"Longbottom," Shacklebolt said, or a man he rather hoped wasn't Shacklebolt because damn, his eyes were blurry. The stranger's voice was coloured rich with amusement. "You're smashed."

"Nah," Neville sighed happily, head lolled back and swimming with wild ideas. "Just completely mad about posies. I think I want a whole pocket full."

"Oh?" There was an audible laugh. "And what about pansies?"

Neville didn't really remember anything after that.

Lucky that Pansy had keys to the flat.

He'd given them to her one day and somehow never gotten them back. He rather thought they were lost to her, sort of like his heart.

* * *

><p>"Ginger bastard… I can't believe I'm feeling this pain because of him." Malfoy groaned.<p>

"I need a honeymoon too." Harry whined, clutching at his eyes, glasses askew. "Think if I tell them I'm a werewolf I can leave early?"

Neville buried his own head with as much of his robes as possible. "Please… Quiet…" He felt like death.

Auror Instructor Pease was not a forgiving woman and clapped brightly to signify the start of class (which was really much earlier than should have been legal on the morning after their best friend's wedding.)

"Hung over, troops?"

That was the understatement of the year.

That day, Neville wasn't sure how they made it out of training alive.

* * *

><p>He was only two steps away from the floo when Shacklebolt's voice rent the air.<p>

"Ah, Longbottom!"

Neville cringed, his head splitting and throbbing at the loud words echoing down the hallway. He struggled to compose himself, turning swiftly on his heel and standing at parade rest as the older wizard came to a halt in front of him.

"Enjoying the after effects today, I presume. Pease informed me her class was quite sluggish today."

"Yes, sir." Neville grimaced, ready to spew apologies or maybe just spew. The lights were much too bright.

Shacklebolt just chuckled. "Relax, you're not on duty at the moment or in the classroom, are you?"

Neville sighed and wilted minutely.

"About your lady friend…"

Neville froze and fought not to stare at his superior in complete terror.

"She's very lovely." Shacklebolt continued. "Why, reminded me of my own wife we were younger…"

Neville's gut turned to a hard lump of anxiety and embarrassment.

"Can't say I've ever seen her around before."

"Uh, her name's Pansy. Pansy Parkinson." Neville swallowed thickly. "And she doesn't work at the Ministry, sir."

"No? Then where?" If Shacklebolt was affected by her last name, since her family had been linked to dark activity during the war, he didn't show it and seemed genuinely curious.

Neville swallowed again, unsuccessful in dislodging the lump in his throat.

"Well, she's in between jobs… I think."

"The Parkinson family is under the keen watch of the ministry, just the same as many other pureblood families that supported or benefitted from the exploits of You-Know-Who." The older man said, but there was no suspicious undercurrent to his words.

"A lot of younger witches and wizards are afraid to approach the Ministry for positions, because of the increased vigilance. But I'll let you in on something. We're hurting for wands here."

Neville balked.

"I'm going over resumes as we speak." Shacklebolt hefted a suitcase that he hadn't noticed. "Tell her to send one in, or if that doesn't work, sneak it out and bring it to my office."

"Uh, yes, sir." Neville could barely believe his ears and blinked rapidly to stay focussed. "Thank you."

Shacklebolt turned to go, but paused and looked over his shoulder as though he had something important yet difficult to say.

"I knew your parents, Mr. Longbottom. Merlin help them for what happened…" He started out in a quiet tone and at the sudden gloss of pity that traced through_ those_ words, Neville found his voice.

"Not to be blunt sir, but not even Merlin could. They're gone." He shook his head. "I still visit, but..."

"Maybe so, but our parentage reflects us, even if we don't want it to. What I meant to say was… You'll be a fine Auror, Longbottom." Shacklebolt tipped his head and Neville's heart swelled.

"Ta."

* * *

><p>The next time Pansy Parkinson was in his home, Neville sat her down at the desk and pushed the chair straight in so she couldn't get out.<p>

"What's this about?" She questioned suspiciously, already vexed by his actions.

She'd come with takeaway and a smile and Neville felt immediately guilty for having to ignore her bizarre ill-timed thoughtfulness. He swallowed and made a mental note to leave the room before she noticed he'd glued her skirt to the seat cushion. It was his Uncle Algie's favourite chair. He hoped she appreciated the things he did for her sake sometimes.

"Today we're working on your list of credentials!" He made a show of waving around her favourite stationary, the scented ones that reminded him of Hogwarts and the mirror – which, come to think of it, he hadn't looked at in a long time.

"My what?" She asked and then comprehension behind hazel eyes flared. "You can't be serious. What brought this on?"

"We're going to get you that Ministry job, like you wanted."

"How did you know I…" She trailed off, eyes falling down to the parchment. "There must be some sort of opening in your section—No! Absolutely not! When couples work together they eventually tear each other's heads off! Being around _you_ for all hours of the day would likely drive me _insane._"

Neville's mind reeled from the loud onslaught.

"First, Harry and Ron are the best of friends and have been working together well." He smartly left out the mentions of their numerous spats, quarrels, and that case which had involved a drinking well, a mule, and a one-eyed witch.

"I'm eternally waiting for Weasley and Potter to maul each other."

"And two," He continued, trying to keep the disbelief out of his voice, "What do you mean by maul—"

"Neville!" She slapped a palm against the solid desk surface. "If you finish that out loud, I will do something _awful._ And I refuse to be your coffee wench!"

"What?" Neville gaped. "No. No! I don't even drink coffee— Look, I was just… thinking about ou-" He caught himself, and instead said:

"_Your_— future, that's all."

Pansy was silent for a time, _tap-tap-tapping_ her nails against the parchments before her.

"Oh, I get it." She said just as Neville's grip on the back of the chair had relaxed. She crossed her ankles and leaning back to look straight up at his face. He felt vaguely horrified that she could probably see up his nose and pointedly looked away.

She smirked. "I hate subtlety, Longbottom."

Neville wasn't sure _how_ she could have figured out the nuances of his actions based on a conversation she'd never even heard, but he feared her knowing powers all the same.

Pansy squinted and pursed her lips. "But I suppose it could be worse, if I'm stuck with you _and _the curse. It seems you came as a set."

"Do you… I don't know," He almost let the question fade away entirely, but was brave. "Do you mind getting stuck with me?"

Pansy shook her head, grinning and already scratching at the parchments with an outrageously fuchsia quill. She didn't answer him, and Neville looked up at the ceiling, hands stuffed in his pockets as he nodded and head out to the kitchen.

"The real question," Pansy called out as soon as he was in the other room, "Is if you want to get stuck to _me_."

Neville's lips pressed together into a twisted, wonderfully embarrassed smile. He spoke quietly to himself:

"I already am."

* * *

><p>She actually sat until it was complete, all seven pages of it, as per the custom of Wizarding applications. A page more or less was a sign of bad conduct. Of course she screamed down the flat when there was an ominous ripping sound.<p>

Neville nearly spit out his drink. He'd forgotten that bit.

And then Pansy stood there in the doorway of the kitchen, not a hair out of place until one realized she was standing there in just her knickers, tapping her wand against her chin.

Neville spat out his drink.

"Touché." Pansy said sardonically, not bothering to acknowledge his choking and sputtering, or the fact that she'd just been sprayed by a fine mist of pumpkin juice. "Part of your master plan no doubt."

Neville fumbled, trying to cover his eyes without being a complete dolt about it.

"No! Of course not—"

She shrugged and padded into the kitchen to take the nearly empty juice glass from the countertop. Every step caused heart palpitations in Neville's chest.

"You're buying me a new skirt." She carelessly flung the glass in the sink, obviously unaware that wearing only tiny pink frills of lace under her skirts was completely reprehensible.

"Maybe." He compromised. "Or maybe I'll—ahhhhh…" He backed up into the icebox. He definitely hadn't noticed her wand pointed at him.

There was a ripping sound and Neville's hands flew to cover his suddenly very breezy stomach. The bottom flaps of severed fabric fell onto his feet.

He yelped, looking down to see she'd turned his plaid shirt into a crop top.

Pansy laughed up a storm.

"Don't worry," Pansy turned and made sure to sashay around the counter even though he most certainly wasn't looking. "I'll pay you back when I'm hired."

There wasn't a shred of sincerity in her voice often and he knew they were still okay.

"What about this shirt?" He asked hopefully, breathlessly looking through his eyelashes at her and wondering if his cheeks weren't quite as red as he imagined.

"I hate all your shirts."

He dropped his arms and watched her lips failing awfully to stay in a straight line.

"You do?" Neville asked and put fists upon his hips. Her eyes were glued to the line of his stomach and pasty white skin.

"And I hate you too."

Her mouth twitched, and he loved how Pansy never bothered to hide her mirth, because there wasn't much worse things that he could think of, than not sharing these laughing carefree moments with her.

"You'll do great, Pansy." Neville said softer this time, and felt that indescribable bubbling feeling of bliss burst inside his chest, like a champagne bottle shaken up. He couldn't help it, and surged forward to hug her tightly.

Pansy elbowed him but he twirled them in a half-dozen tight circles, making her dark hair fan out and a girlish shriek to echo through the kitchen.

"You're mental!" Snickers sprinkled through the air like confetti as she swung her legs around his hips to better hold on.

Neville grinned at her, thudding to a stop to lean against the wall tapestry, feeling dizzy but not caring. He inexplicably knew from the smirk on her face that really, truly and honestly, it didn't matter if she would never say what she truly thought.

He felt so profoundly proud. So proud because, in all the bizarreness of the world, she liked _him_. Even prouder, because no one would have believed how far they'd come. How close they'd become. Actually, this was the closest they'd ever been.

Neville felt acute embarrassment.

"I've been deliberately rearranging the mirror." Pansy said, a sudden hot breath in his ear. Neville pulled back just enough to look her in the face. Her arms looped around his neck.

They stared at each other, Pansy hard-faced and determined and her knees pinched his hips as though she was waiting for him to drop her. She should have known by now he'd never.

"That would explain some things." Neville chose to say carefully.

"It's not that I don't hate being cursed." Pansy's nose scrunched up in distaste. "Only that I feel lucky when I'm with you. Just don't tell anyone I said that."

"You do?" Neville whispered back, heart racing.

"Idiot." She said. "I can't stop thinking about your hideous hippogriffic lunges."

"Lunges." Neville parroted, gobsmacked.

He stared at her, pressing his lips together to stop the jumbled mess of idiocy that wanted to spill forth.

Pansy scowled, touching her nose to his. "Don't think I'll be your sodding girlfriend now that you've moved up from Remedial."

"All right." He acquiesced, quietly. "Except that you're already my girlfriend."

Pansy paused and scowled. "I'm not going to be your live-in wench either."

"All right." He said again, trying to keep a straight face but couldn't help the way his mouth twisted up at the sides. "You'd kill me in my sleep. Because I snore."

"Gryffindors!" Pansy rolled her eyes and then stopped, licking her bottom lip before biting it softly. "I know you're always so bloody late, but after saying…_ that_…" She bit her lip again. "Don't you think it's about time I _get_ lucky?"

It took a moment before that made any sense in his brain.

"Uhhh…"

Neville nodded once but it felt like his neck was bolted into place. Panic and excitement bubbled up in his chest like a cauldron of Veritaserum boiling over.

"Bedroom. Now!" She grabbed him by the collar and squeezed her thighs. Neville's whole body _jumped._

He marched them down the busy wallpapered hallway and Pansy forced him to stop and lay against the door to his bedroom as she kissed him with a fierceness he'd never known. Neville's hand covered the knob, holding it fast, not wanting to let it fall open. Because that would also be like letting her in on everything he'd wanted for so long. Her fingers digging into the flesh of his midsection were like fingernails clawing through the Devil's Snare of his mind.

"Neville. Open the bloody door."

Pansy kissed low into his chest, fingers so carefully looped around his ears, finally too fed up with thinking of insults. And Neville must have stopped thinking too, because he twisted the handle and they stumbled backwards into the darkness, and he fell back onto his bed with Pansy Parkinson on top of him.

* * *

><p>After she moved herself into a desk at the Ministry, Pansy moved in with him.<p>

The shoe tree by the doorway loved to untie his laces when he wasn't watching and tie them to the opposite shoe when he was running late. It had also made an awful habit of eating the heels off Pansy's pumps every chance it got. Well, Neville hoped it was the tree's appetite to blame. He hated to think Pansy was walking around out there, breaking heels on random cracks in the road and letting her displeasure unravel onto whoever was closest.

He would bite his lip to squelch the grin that threatened to form.

The mirror became like a chore, and sometimes they would go weeks without opening up the packet.

Sometimes he'd come home to find her sitting at the table, shifting pieces around with one finger, chin rested snugly against her palm and then his shoes would clatter onto the mat and the shoe tree would grab them up and she'd push it aside to conjure takeaway boxes from the kitchen.

She worked in the Department of Mysteries as a shelving steward, slowly working her way up.

Neville privately thought it was a rather difficult position and deserved all the trashing Pansy could throw at it. Turned out her bosses, whom she had many and all contradicting in their orders, never told her what or where anything was. Hard to file in that situation, Neville was sure.

"I'm getting so sick of it." Pansy complained one day, kicking at the grabby branches of the shoe tree. He walked in behind her and hung up both their robes.

"They could invest on some decent cleansing charms. The north ward always reeks of fertilizer and rain."

"That's not a bad sort of smell." Neville replied, thinking of many damp afternoons spent in the Hogwarts Greenhouses.

"Do you think if I brought in some of the muggle tree talismans they'd argue?"

"Who could argue with you trying to spruce up the place?"

And Neville knew she was incomprehensibly _the one_ when she actually laughed, long and hard. The cupid's arrow through his heart was surely the fact that she was almost always laughing _at _him and he didn't mind at all.

"_Spruce. _Neville, don't quit your day job you adorable berk, because I'm about ready to quit mine."

"You can do whatever you like." Neville had said, honest and heart in his voice. "I'll never leaf you."

"You're barking mad." Pansy replied. "And full of sap."

"And you're unlucky."

Pansy just smiled serenely before the shoe tree whapped him in the shin.

"Maybe."

* * *

><p>In his final year of training, Neville and the rest of the Aurors found themselves in a guided tour of the Department of Mysteries.<p>

The trainees trailed after Auror Dawlish like red ducklings, gawking from side to side at the towering shelves of secrets. It was an enjoyable experience to get a look at the better-kept secrets of the Ministry they were sworn to serve and protect. Though there were one or two department workers who stalked them with hawk-eyes, probably remembering the great prophecy smashing debacle way back from fifth year.

As they passed by a door Neville was ensnared by the scent of plum blossoms and freesia so suddenly he stood stock still forcing Malfoy to slam straight into his back.

"Where's the fire?" Malfoy sniped, rubbing at his flattened nose.

"I just…" Neville's eyebrows furrowed together as he thought. "What's in that section?"

Auror Dawlish straightened his robes primly, overhearing an opportunity for a teaching moment.

"That? The fountain of Amortentia's in there. It's huge – and dangerous. Very dangerous. Best to stay clear actually. Can anyone tell me why that particular substance is so restricted?" Dawlish chattered on to the class arms gesturing wildly, his large pipe creating swirls of smoke to curl under Neville's nose.

He waved it away and stared at the ward for a while, and stared over his shoulder even longer even as they walked, Dawlish leading the group away to the next point of interest.

And that's how he knew Pansy Parkinson loved him too.

* * *

><p>"We'll miss you 'round here, you know." Harry said solemnly.<p>

"Aye, won't be the same." Ron said in a thick accent. He'd just returned from stealth surveillance and his disguise hadn't worn off yet. "'N all the plants in th'office will right die w'out you! Just you watch."

"I'd be more worried about you than the plants." Neville smiled, touched. It had been a close call on an easy job turned dangerous one night.

Harry started thumping Ron on the back to help shake off some of the glamour charm. On one particularly hard thump the ginger came back to his hair and his large handlebar moustache popped back into place.

"Can you believe we've been doing this for so long?" Harry asked.

"All of eighth year, three years of training and three years into the service." Malfoy announced as he entered the office, primly smoothing his hair, which had begun to recede in the most amusing way. "Seems about just the right amount of time for him to leave in my opinion."

Harry rolled his eyes but Neville laughed.

"My curse of seven years with the pleasure of your acquaintance has been finally lifted!"

Malfoy snickered sharply. "Please. You'll never be rid of my acquaintance."

"I'll miss you too, Draco."

There was a chorus of sarcastic _awww_s which made the blond go red in the face with anger and embarrassment.

"Mr. Longbottom, sir!" An reedy voice split through the friendly chitchat and well-wishing.

"Ackerly." Neville smiled, putting the rest of his personal affects into his briefcase with a well-thought _Pack!_

Stewart Ackerly was an eager new graduate of the Auror program whom Neville had been training to be his replacement. Apparently seeing Neville's successful graduation of the remedial classes at Hogwarts is what made the skinny wizard decide to go into the service – witches like that sort of thing, he'd supposed.

"I just wanted to say again, congratulations on your service." Stewart intoned with great thoughtfulness as they made their way to the practice room to continue his Patronus training. Malfoy would have to take over if the younger wizard didn't succeed this time. It was Neville's last day at Auror Headquarters after all.

"Though I must say, I'm surprised you're going back to Hogwarts." Stewart murmured.

"Oh?" Neville replied, letting loose the training boggart.

"I mean, if the _remedial_ class – no offence— could all become such amazing Aurors, I get chills of excitement thinking of what I can contribute!"

So many years later, Neville still didn't have the heart to tell him he hadn't actually been dunce.

They practiced for a while, Neville correcting and feeding suggestions as the younger man tried his best.

"I can't get it right at all, am I thinking the wrong thing?" Stewart asked unhappily, wiping sweat from his brow.

"Try not to think _too_ much. It's got to fill you up, Ackerly. You've got to let the feeling cover you, like a blanket."

Stewart made a constipated face for about a minute before letting out a breath of defeat. "Please, tell me, what's your happiest memory?"

Neville thought of many things, so many things, but only smiled, amused. "That's not going to work. You've got to think of one yourself."

"Well let me see it. Show me again."

"All right, but you've got to try again after."

It was prudent to note that Neville's Patronus was a Mimbulus Mimbletonia.

It hummed and spit some silvery Stinksap and was an overall unpleasant looking thing, scuttling around on its exposed root system in ghostly form. Most of the other Aurors thought his happy thought was a twisted sordid thing to bring about the boiled cactus, and some were flabbergasted that a dodgy plant could even make a good messenger. But plants were life forms too and who said he couldn't have a plant as his? Besides, all of the team, and now even his replacement, could see the contentment that filled Neville's features when he called it forth by the powerful charm.

Ackerly twitched and raised his wand again and Neville helped him adjust his motions. He could feel the younger man eyeing the ring on his left hand as usual. Quickly though, Stewart frowned in concentration, incanted the charm, and managed a bouncing ball of cheerful silver mist.

"I thought I saw a tail on that one!" Neville grinned in triumph.

"_NEV!"_ Ron burst into the practice room, rapidly annoyed by the looks of it.

He flew into familiar alert mode. "What happened?"

"Pansy's at the floo, screaming the bloody _coals_ off the fire— I thought her bad luck was supposed to wear off any day now? She's somehow sprouted antlers!"

Weedy little Ackerly smiled, scratching at the side of his twitchy nose. "Longbottom, I hope you know you're one lucky man."

And Neville Longbottom, who had everything he could have ever wanted, decided that yes, he knew.

* * *

><p>THE END<p> 


End file.
